Visual Servoing Control of Soft Robots based on Finite Element Model

International audienceIn this paper, we propose a strategy for the control of soft robots with visual tracking and simulation-based predictor. A kinematic model of soft robots is obtained thanks to the Finite Element Method (FEM) computed in real-time. The FEM allows to obtain a prediction of the Jacobian matrix of the robot. This allows a first control of the robot, in the actuator space. Then, a second control strategy based on the feedback of infrared cameras is developed to obtain a correction of the effector position. The robust stability of this closed-loop system is obtained based on Lyapunov stability theory. Otherwise, to deal with the problem of image features (the marker points placed on the end effector of soft robot) loss, a switched control strategy is proposed to combine both the open-loop controller and the closed-loop controller. Finally, experiments on a parallel soft robot driven by four cables are conducted and show the effectiveness of these methods for the real-time control of soft robots

Advances in Image Processing, Analysis and Recognition Technology

For many decades, researchers have been trying to make computers’ analysis of images as effective as the system of human vision is. For this purpose, many algorithms and systems have previously been created. The whole process covers various stages, including image processing, representation and recognition. The results of this work can be applied to many computer-assisted areas of everyday life. They improve particular activities and provide handy tools, which are sometimes only for entertainment, but quite often, they significantly increase our safety. In fact, the practical implementation of image processing algorithms is particularly wide. Moreover, the rapid growth of computational complexity and computer efficiency has allowed for the development of more sophisticated and effective algorithms and tools. Although significant progress has been made so far, many issues still remain, resulting in the need for the development of novel approaches

Object Detection Using Multi-Scale Balanced Sampling

Detecting small objects and objects with large scale variants are always challenging for deep learning based object detection approaches. Many efforts have been made to solve these problems such as adopting more effective network structures, image features, loss functions, etc. However, for both small objects detection and detecting objects with various scale in single image, the first thing should be solve is the matching mechanism between anchor boxes and ground-truths. In this paper, an approach based on multi-scale balanced sampling(MB-RPN) is proposed for the difficult matching of small objects and detecting multi-scale objects. According to the scale of the anchor boxes, different positive and negative sample IOU discriminate thresholds are adopted to improve the probability of matching the small object area with the anchor boxes so that more small object samples are included in the training process. Moreover, the balanced sampling method is proposed for the collected samples, the samples are further divided and uniform sampling to ensure the diversity of samples in training process. Several datasets are adopted to evaluate the MB-RPN, the experimental results show that compare with the similar approach, MB-RPN improves detection performances effectively

Contribution à la navigation d'un robot mobile par commande référencée multi-capteurs

In this manuscript, we consider the problem of mobile robots navigation using multisensor- based control. Our objective is to safely perform vision-based displacements through poorly known indoor environments which may be evolutive and cluttered. The missions to be realized consist in positioning the vehicle with respect to a landmark or a person of interest. To do so, different problems have to be addressed : the motion towards the goal, the obstacle avoidance, the occlusion management, the realization of long range vision-based displacements. If the first three mentioned points are typically local issues, the last one requires to give the robot global skills. Our works have dealt with each of these problems, but, in a first step, we have only considered local issues. We have thus developed an image based visual servoing (IBVS) allowing to make the robot converge towards either a landmark or a person of interest, thus performing the nominal vision-based task. However, although this kind of control is known for its nice robustness properties, it does not allow to efficiently treat the problems of collisions and occlusions. Therefore, our next contributions have consisted in designing multi-sensor-based control strategies guaranteeing non collision when the environment is cluttered with non occluding obstacles. Then, in the sequel of these results, we have addressed the problem of the image features loss. We have designed algorithms allowing to reconstruct the visual signals when an occlusion occurs. These algorithms have then been coupled to the above mentioned control strategies, allowing to safely perform the navigation task amidst both occluding and non occluding obstacles. At this step, the mission can be realized only if the goal can be perceived from the robot initial configuration, which is not the case for a long range navigation. Our last contributions have tried to answer this problem by giving the vehicle the required global skills. To do so, we have coup led a topological map representing the environment to a supervision algorithm managing the control strategy. In this way, the robot is able to perform vision-based long range displacements in an environment cluttered with both occluding and non occluding obstacles. These works have been validated in simulation and implemented on our robots. The obtained results have shown the efficiency of the proposed approach and have opened new interesting research axes.Dans ce manuscrit, nous nous intéressons au problème de la navigation d'un robot mobile par commande référencée multi-capteurs. Notre objectif est d'effectuer des tâches de navigation guidées par la vision dans des environnements d'intérieur structurés peu connus, possiblement évolutifs et où l'homme peut être présent. Les missions considérées pourront inclure de longs déplacements et consisteront à positionner le robot vis-à-vis d'un amer ou d'une personne d'intérêt. Leur position dans la scène étant inconnue, ils seront repérés par la vision. Afin de pouvoir réaliser de telles missions, différents problèmes doivent être traités : le mouvement vers le but, l'évitement d'obstacles, le traitement des occultations, la réalisation de longs déplacements. Si les trois premiers points ont un caractère intrinsèquement local, le dernier nécessite des compétences globales. Les travaux que nous avons menés cherchent à répondre à ces différents problèmes. Tout d'abord, nous nous sommes focalisés sur les aspects "locaux". Nous avons ainsi exploité l'asservissement visuel 2D pour réaliser la tâche de navigation nominale et permettre au robot de converger vers un amer ou une personne d'intérêt. Cependant, bien que cette technique présente de bonnes propriétés de robustesse, elle ne permet pas à elle seule de traiter efficacement les problèmes de collisions et d'occultations. Une de nos premières contributions a donc consisté en le développement de stratégies de commande garantissant la non collision en présence d'obstacles non occultants. Sur la base de ces résultats, nous nous sommes intéressés à la gestion des occultations et avons développé des algorithmes permettant de reconstruire les indices visuels lorsque ceux-ci sont indisponibles. Nous les avons ensuite couplés à nos stratégies de commande afin que le robot puisse évoluer à partir des indices visuels réels ou reconstruits selon le cas. L'association de ces différents techniques et algorithmes a permis de réaliser effica cement des tâches de navigation référencées vision en présence d'obstacles occultants et non occultants. Cependant, elle nécessite que l'amer ou la personne d'intérêt soit visible dès le début de la mission, ce qui n'est pas le cas lorsque l'on souhaite réaliser de longs déplacements. Nos dernières contributions sont donc focalisées sur ce problème. Afin de conférer au robot les compétences globales nécessaires, nous avons couplé une carte topologique représentant l'environnement à un algorithme de supervision gérant la stratégie de commande. Le robot est ainsi devenu capable d'effectuer de longs déplacements dans des scènes peu connues. L'ensemble de ces travaux a été validé en simulation et expérimentalement sur les différents robots à disposition. Les résultats obtenus montrent la pertinence de l'approche proposée et ouvrent des perspectives prometteuses dans et hors du contexte de la navigation