Dispositivo útil para la generación de mapas de contorno y sus aplicaciones

Dispositivo útil para la generación de mapas de contorno y sus aplicaciones. La presente invención describe un ispositivo útil para la generación de mapas de contorno que comprende un soporte abierto, cerrado o con cualquier forma, sobre el que sitúa una red de uno o más medidores de distancia puntuales dispuestos consecutivamente alrededor del perímetro de dicho soporte creando una zona o perímetro de medición cerrado y continuo. Este dispositivo puede acoplarse a un aparato, con o sin capacidad de movilidad, por ejemplo un robot manipulador de objetos, un robot detector de minas antipersonas, un sistema de direccionamiento de una persona ciega, un robot volador (como un quadrotor o helicóptero autónomo), etc.Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (España)B1 Patente con informe sobre el estado de la ténic

Sensors in agriculture and forestry

Agriculture and Forestry are two broad and promising areas demanding technological solutions with the aim of increasing production or accurate inventories for sustainability while the environmental impact is minimized by reducing the application of agro-chemicals and increasing the use of environmental friendly agronomical practices. In addition, the immediate consequence of this “trend” is the reduction of production costs. Sensors-based technologies provide appropriate tools to achieve the above mentioned goals. The explosive technological advances and development in recent years enormously facilitates the attainment of these objectives removing many barriers for their implementation, including the reservations expressed by the farmers themselves. Precision Agriculture is an emerging area where sensor-based technologies play an important role.RHEA project [42], which is funded by the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under Grant Agreement NO.245986, which has been the platform for the two international conferences on Robotics and associated High-technologies and Equipment mentioned above.Peer Reviewe

A classification of stability margins for walking robots

Throughout the history of walking robots several static and dynamic stability criteria have been defined. Nevertheless, different applications may require different stability criteria and, up to the authors’ best knowledge, there is no qualitative classification of such stability measurements. Controlling a robot gait by means of using the wrong stability criterion may prevent the task from succeeding. By the other hand, if the optimum criterion is found the robot gait can also be optimized. In this work, the stability criteria that have been applied to walking robots with at least four legs are examined attending to the stability margin on different static and dynamic situations. As a result, a qualitative classification of stability criteria for walking machines is proposed so that the proper criterion can be chosen for every desired application.Peer reviewe

Strategy and Standards in Remote Handling for Fusion Energy from TECHNOFUSION

The authors discuss the importance of the TECHNOFUSIÓN facility from the standpoint of Remote Handling and its special features with regard to the other laboratories. This arises to the interest of developing a long-term integrated approach, which covers research, training, exploitation and dissemination of results. Standardization activity is also closely related to long-term strategy. It is shown the actual situation of standardization in Remote Handling for the nuclear industry and the evolution that is currently taking place in this field.Peer Reviewe

Analyzing energy-efficient configurations in hexapod robots for demining applications

Purpose – Reducing energy consumption in walking robots is an issue of great importance in field applications such as humanitarian demining so as to increase mission time for a given power supply. The purpose of this paper is to address the problem of improving energy efficiency in statically stable walking machines by comparing two leg, insect and mammal, configurations on the hexapod robotic platform SILO6. Design/methodology/approach – Dynamic simulation of this hexapod is used to develop a set of rules that optimize energy expenditure in both configurations. Later, through a theoretical analysis of energy consumption and experimental measurements in the real platform SILO6, a configuration is chosen. Findings – It is widely accepted that the mammal configuration in statically stable walking machines is better for supporting high loads, while the insect configuration is considered to be better for improving mobility. However, taking into account the leg dynamics and not only the body weight, different results are obtained. In a mammal configuration, supporting body weight accounts for 5 per cent of power consumption while leg dynamics accounts for 31 per cent. Originality/value – As this paper demonstrates, the energy expended when the robot walks along a straight and horizontal line is the same for both insect and mammal configurations, while power consumption during crab walking in an insect configuration exceeds power consumption in the mammal configuration

DYLEMA: Using walking robots for landmine detection and location

Detection and removal of antipersonnel landmines is an important worldwide concern. A huge number of landmines has been deployed over the last twenty years, and demining will take several more decades, even if no more mines were deployed in future. An adequate mineclearance rate can only be achieved by using new technologies such as improved sensors, efficient manipulators and mobile robots. This paper presents some basic ideas on the configuration of a mobile system for detecting and locating antipersonnel landmines efficiently and effectively. The paper describes the main features of the overall system, which consists of a sensor head that can detect certain landmine types, a manipulator to move the sensor head over large areas, a locating system based on a global-positioning system, a remote supervisor computer and a legged robot used as the subsystems’ carrier. The whole system has been configured to work in a semi-autonomous mode with a view also to robot mobility and energy efficiency.This work has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology under Grant CICYT DPI2001-1595 and DPI2004-05824.Peer reviewe

Intelligent system to control electric power distribution networks

The use of high voltage power lines transport involves some risks that may be avoided with periodic reviews as imposed by law in most countries. The objective of this work is to reduce the number of these periodic reviews so that the maintenance cost of power lines is also reduced. To reduce the number of transmission towers (TT) to be reviewed, a virtual organization (VO) based system of agents is proposed in conjunction with different artificial intelligence methods and algorithms. This system is able to propose a sample of TT from a selected set to be reviewed and to ensure that the whole set will have similar values without needing to review all the TT. As a result, the system provides a software solution to manage all the review processes and all the TT of Spain, allowing the review companies to use the application either when they initiate a new review process for a whole line or area of TT, or when they want to place an entirely new set of TT, in which case the system would recommend the best place and the best type of structure to use

Assessing a fleet of robots for herbicide applications

Advanced technologies are critical for safe, site-specific and efficient control of pests (weeds, pathogens and insects) in agricultural crops. Although the scientific and technological bases of precision crop protection are mostly known and robust, the commercial application of these new technologies is still very limited. To overcome this situation, new farming methods and processes should be designed. Modern approaches rely on existing information and communication technologies (ICT) and design and construction of improved pest and crop sensors, along with enhanced pest control actuators. Mobile platforms are essential to move the needed sensors and actuators throughout the work field. Moreover, by using autonomous mobile platforms equipped with innovative perception techniques, data processing systems and tools for action, pest control procedures can be applied only if, when and where they are needed, reducing costs, environmental damages and risks for farmers. This article describes the RHEA fleet of robots highlighting the concepts and analyzing the results achieved on the application of herbicide on wheat with a spray boom.This project is funded in part by the 7th Framework Programme of the European Union under Grant Agreement No. 245986.Peer Reviewe

SILO6: A six-legged robot for humanitarian de-mining tasks

Detection and removal of antipersonnel landmines in infested fields is an important worldwide problem. Around 100 million landmines have been deployed over the last two decades, and demining will take several more decades, even if no more mines were deployed in future. A high mine-clearance rate can only be accomplished by using new technologies such as improved sensors, efficient manipulators and mobile robots. This paper presents some basic ideas on the configuration and controller of a mobile system for detecting and locating antipersonnel landmines in an efficient and effective way. The whole system has been configured to work in a semi-autonomous mode with a view also to robot mobility and energy efficiency. The paper outlines the main features of the overall system and focuses on some aspects of the controller.This work has been funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology under Grant CICYT DPI2001-1595.Peer reviewe

Design of a training tool for improving the use of hand-held detectors in humanitarian demining

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to introduce the design of a training tool intended to improve deminers' technique during close-in detection tasks. Design/methodology/approach – Following an introduction that highlights the impact of mines and improvised explosive devices (IEDs), and the importance of training for enhancing the safety and the efficiency of the deminers, this paper considers the utilization of a sensory tracking system to study the skill of the hand-held detector expert operators. With the compiled information, some critical performance variables can be extracted, assessed, and quantified, so that they can be used afterwards as reference values for the training task. In a second stage, the sensory tracking system is used for analysing the trainee skills. The experimentation phase aims to test the effectiveness of the elements that compose the sensory system to track the hand-held detector during the training sessions. Findings – The proposed training tool will be able to evaluate the deminers' efficiency during the scanning tasks and will provide important information for improving their competences. Originality/value – This paper highlights the need of introducing emerging technologies for enhancing the current training techniques for deminers and proposes a sensory tracking system that can be successfully utilised for evaluating trainees' performance with hand-held detectors