| 1. |
- Abdul Khaliq, Ali, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Point-to-point safe navigation of a mobile robot using stigmergy and RFID technology
- 2016
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Ingår i: 2016 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS). - : Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). - 9781509037629 ; , s. 1497-1504
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Reliable autonomous navigation is still a challenging problem for robots with simple and inexpensive hardware. A key difficulty is the need to maintain an internal map of the environment and an accurate estimate of the robot’s position in this map. Recently, a stigmergic approach has been proposed in which a navigation map is stored into the environment, on a grid of RFID tags, and robots use it to optimally reach predefined goal points without the need for internal maps. While effective,this approach is limited to a predefined set of goal points. In this paper, we extend this approach to enable robots to travel to any point on the RFID floor, even if it was not previously identified as a goal location, as well as to keep a safe distance from any given critical location. Our approach produces safe, repeatable and quasi-optimal trajectories without the use of internal maps, self localization, or path planning. We report experiments run in a real apartment equipped with an RFID floor, in which a service robot either reaches or avoids a user who wears slippers equipped with an RFID tag reader.
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| 2. |
- Hernandez Bennetts, Victor, 1980-, et al.
(författare)
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Gasbot : A Mobile Robotic Platform for Methane Leak Detection and Emission Monitoring
- 2012
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Ingår i: Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), Workshop on Robotics for Environmental Monitoring (WREM), Vilamoura, Portugal, October 7-12, 2012.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Due to its environmental, economical and safety implications, methane leak detection is a crucial task to address in the biogas production industry. In this paper, we introduce Gasbot, a robotic platform that aims to automatize methane emission monitoring in landfills and biogas production sites. The distinctive characteristic of the Gasbot platform is the use of a Tunable Laser Absorption Spectroscopy (TDLAS) sensor, along with a novel gas distribution algorithm to generate methane concentration maps of indoor and outdoor exploration areas. The Gasbot platform has been tested in two different scenarios: an underground corridor, where a pipeline leak was simulated and in a decommissioned landfill site, where an artificial methane emission source was introduced.
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| 3. |
- Hernandez Bennetts, Victor Manuel, 1980-, et al.
(författare)
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Towards Real-World Gas Distribution Mapping and Leak Localization Using a Mobile Robot with 3D and Remote Gas Sensing Capabilities
- 2013
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Ingår i: 2013 IEEE INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON ROBOTICS AND AUTOMATION (ICRA). - : IEEE conference proceedings. ; , s. 2335-2340
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Due to its environmental, economical and safety implications, methane leak detection is a crucial task to address in the biogas production industry. In this paper, we introduce Gasbot, a robotic platform that aims to automatize methane emission monitoring in landfills and biogas production sites. The distinctive characteristic of the Gasbot platform is the use of a Tunable Laser Absorption Spectroscopy (TDLAS) sensor. This sensor provides integral concentration measurements over the path of the laser beam. Existing gas distribution mapping algorithms can only handle local measurements obtained from traditional in-situ chemical sensors. In this paper we also describe an algorithm to generate 3D methane concentration maps from integral concentration and depth measurements. The Gasbot platform has been tested in two different scenarios: an underground corridor, where a pipeline leak was simulated and in a decommissioned landfill site, where an artificial methane emission source was introduced.
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| 4. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Children playing with robots using stigmergy on a smart floor
- 2016
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Ingår i: 2016 Intl IEEE Conferences on Ubiquitous Intelligence & Computing, Advanced and Trusted Computing, Scalable Computing and Communications, Cloud and Big Data Computing, Internet of People, and Smart World Congress (UIC/ATC/ScalCom/CBDCom/IoP/SmartWorld). - : Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). - 9781509027712 ; , s. 1098-1103
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Reliable and safe interaction is essential when humans and robots move in close proximity. In this paper, we present a stigmergic approach where humans interact with robots via a smart floor. Stigmergy has been widely studied in robotic systems, however, HRI has thus far not availed itself of stigmergic solutions. We realize a stigmergic medium via RFID tags embedded in the floor, and use these to enable robot navigation, human tracking, as well as the interaction between robots and humans. The proposed method allows to employ robots with minimal sensing and computation capabilities. The approach relies only on the RFID sensors and the information stored in the tags, and no internal map is required for navigation. We design and implement a prototype game which involves a robot and a child moving together in a shared space. The prototype demonstrates that the approach is reliable and adheres to given safety constraints when human and robot are moving within close proximity of each other.
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| 5. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Culturally aware Planning and Execution of Robot Actions
- 2018
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Ingår i: 2018 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS). - : IEEE. - 9781538680940 - 9781538680957 ; , s. 326-332
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- The way in which humans behave, speak andinteract is deeply influenced by their culture. For example,greeting is done differently in France, in Sweden or in Japan;and the average interpersonal distance changes from onecultural group to the other. In order to successfully coexistwith humans, robots should also adapt their behavior to theculture, customs and manners of the persons they interact with.In this paper, we deal with an important ingredient of culturaladaptation: how to generate robot plans that respect givencultural preferences, and how to execute them in a way thatis sensitive to those preferences. We present initial results inthis direction in the context of the CARESSES project, a jointEU-Japan effort to build culturally competent assistive robots.
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| 6. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-
(författare)
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From Ants to Service Robots : an Exploration in Stigmergy-Based Navigation Algorithms
- 2018
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- Navigation is a core functionality of mobile robots. To navigate autonomously, a mobile robot typically relies on internal maps, self-localization, and path planning. Reliable navigation usually comes at the cost of expensive sensors and often requires significant computational overhead.Many insects in nature perform robust, close-to-optimal goal directed navigation without having the luxury of sophisticated sensors, powerful computational resources, or even an internally stored map. They do so by exploiting a simple but powerful principle called stigmergy: they use their environment as an external memory to store, read and share information. In this thesis, we explore the use of stigmergy as an alternative route to realize autonomous navigation in practical robotic systems.In our approach, we realize a stigmergic medium using RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology by embedding a grid of read-write RFID tags in the floor. A set of mobile robots, then, build and store maps used for navigation in the stigmergic medium itself. These maps are of three types: (1) goal maps which guide robots to known locations; (2) clearance maps which help robots avoid obstacles; (3) feature maps which can be used to store observable properties, such as light intensity or gas concentration. We show how these maps can be built both in static and in dynamic environments and used for navigation of heterogeneous robots. We also show that goal maps can be used for navigation to previously unknown and/or dynamic locations, and that feature maps can be used to navigate towards specific features, e.g., places with high gas concentration that are beyond the sensor’s range. We address the issue of perceptual errors (e.g., broken tags) during navigation. We further study the use of the built navigation maps to enable different types of human-aware robot navigation on the RFID floor.We define several stigmergic algorithms for building maps and navigating on these maps. We formally analyse the properties of the main algorithms, and empirically evaluate all the algorithms both in simulation and with multiple physical robots. Results collected from tens of hours of real experiments and thousands of simulated runs demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.
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| 7. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Inexpensive, reliable and localization-free navigation using an RFID floor
- 2015
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Ingår i: 2015 European Conference on Mobile Robots (ECMR). - New York : IEEE conference proceedings. - 9781467391634
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Stigmergy is a principle observed in nature, in which animals store in the environment information to be used for communication or navigation. Stigmergy has recently been exploited in robotics: simple robots store a goal distance field in read-write RFID tags embedded in the floor, and later follow the gradient of this field to navigate optimally to that goal. Stigmergic navigation is localization-free, since robots only rely on the values read from the tags and do not need to know their own location. This makes navigation inexpensive (no ranging sensors) and reliable (no localization failures). To make this approach viable in practice, two issues need to be addressed: how to simplify the installation of an RFID floor; and how to follow the field gradient in a reliable way. This paper presents solutions to both problems. The solutions are validated through experiments performed on simulated and on real robots.
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| 8. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Stigmergic algorithms for multiple minimalistic robots on an RFID floor
- 2014
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Ingår i: Swarm Intelligence. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1935-3820 .- 1935-3812. ; 8:3, s. 199-225
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Stigmergy is a powerful principle in nature, which has been shown to have interesting applications to robotic systems. By leveraging the ability to store information in the environment, robots with minimal sensing, memory, and computational capabilities can solve complex problems like global path planning. In this paper, we discuss the use of stigmergy in minimalist multi-robot systems, in which robots do not need to use any internal model, long-range sensing, or position awareness. We illustrate our discussion with three case studies: building a globally optimal navigation map, building a gradient map of a sensed feature, and updating the above maps dynamically. All case studies have been implemented in a real environment with multiple ePuck robots, using a floor with 1,500 embedded radio frequency identification tags as the stigmergic medium. Results collected from tens of hours of real experiments and thousands of simulated runs demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach.
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| 9. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Stigmergic Algorithms for Simple Robotic Devices (Extended abstract)
- 2013
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Ingår i: Workshop on Unconventional Approaches to Robotics, Automation and Control Inspired by Nature (ICRA 2013).
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- This position paper is meant to discuss the use of stigmergy in minimalist robotic systems, and to argue for a methodological approach based on the combination of formal analysis and empirical evaluation. In the full paper we will illustrate this approach in three case studies: building a globally optimal navigation map, building a gas concentration gradient map, and updating the above maps dynamically. All case studies have been implemented in a real environment with inexpensive robots, using an RFID floor as the stigmergic medium.
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| 10. |
- Khaliq, Ali Abdul, 1987-, et al.
(författare)
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Stigmergy at work : Planning and navigation for a service robot on an RFID floor
- 2015
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Ingår i: IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation. - : IEEE Computer Society. - 9781479969234 ; , s. 1085-1092
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Many species in nature store information in the environment to facilitate the performance of tasks and enable cooperation. This principle is known as stigmergy. Stigmergy has been widely studied in robotic systems, but so far mostly in simulation or in laboratory proofs of concept. In this paper, we propose a stigmergic approach to goal-directed navigation that can be used for navigation of a full-scale robotic system in a real apartment. A team of small ePuck robots build a set of navigation maps directly onto an RFID floor, where each map is associated to one predefined goal. The information stored in the floor can then used by a mid-size robot or by a larger domestic robot to perform safe navigation toward the predefined goals. To navigate, robots only rely on the information read from the RFID tags: in particular, they do not need to use an internal map or to perform self-localization. This results in robust and repeatable navigation with minimal hardware and software requirements.
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