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Hierarchical Object Map Estimation for Efficient and Robust Navigation | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561225/ | [
"Kyel Ok",
"Katherine Liu",
"Nicholas Roy",
"Kyel Ok",
"Katherine Liu",
"Nicholas Roy"
] | We propose a hierarchical representation of objects, where the representation of each object is allowed to change based on the quality of accumulated measurements. We initially estimate each object as a 2D bounding box or a 3D point, encoding only the geometric properties that can be well-constrained using limited viewpoints. With additional measurements, we allow each object to become a higher di... |
Robot Navigation in Constrained Pedestrian Environments using Reinforcement Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560893/ | [
"Claudia Pérez-D’Arpino",
"Can Liu",
"Patrick Goebel",
"Roberto Martín-Martín",
"Silvio Savarese",
"Claudia Pérez-D’Arpino",
"Can Liu",
"Patrick Goebel",
"Roberto Martín-Martín",
"Silvio Savarese"
] | Navigating fluently around pedestrians is a necessary capability for mobile robots deployed in human environments, such as buildings and homes. While research on social navigation has focused mainly on the scalability with the number of pedestrians in open spaces, typical indoor environments present the additional challenge of constrained spaces such as corridors and doorways that limit maneuverab... |
Team Assignment for Heterogeneous Multi-Robot Sensor Coverage through Graph Representation Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561082/ | [
"Brian Reily",
"Hao Zhang",
"Brian Reily",
"Hao Zhang"
] | Sensor coverage is the critical multi-robot problem of maximizing the detection of events in an environment through the deployment of multiple robots. Large multi-robot systems are often composed of simple robots that are typically not equipped with a complete set of sensors, so teams with comprehensive sensing abilities are required to properly cover an area. Robots also exhibit multiple forms of... |
GPR-based Model Reconstruction System for Underground Utilities Using GPRNet | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561355/ | [
"Jinglun Feng",
"Liang Yang",
"Ejup Hoxha",
"Diar Sanakov",
"Stanislav Sotnikov",
"Jizhong Xiao",
"Jinglun Feng",
"Liang Yang",
"Ejup Hoxha",
"Diar Sanakov",
"Stanislav Sotnikov",
"Jizhong Xiao"
] | Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) is one of the most important non-destructive evaluation (NDE) instruments to detect and locate underground objects (i.e. rebars, utility pipes). Many of the previous researches focus on GPR image-based feature detection only, and none can process sparse GPR measurements to successfully reconstruct a very fine and detailed 3D model of underground objects for better vi... |
Replay Overshooting: Learning Stochastic Latent Dynamics with the Extended Kalman Filter | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560811/ | [
"Albert H. Li",
"Philipp Wu",
"Monroe Kennedy",
"Albert H. Li",
"Philipp Wu",
"Monroe Kennedy"
] | This paper presents replay overshooting (RO), an algorithm that uses properties of the extended Kalman filter (EKF) to learn nonlinear stochastic latent dynamics models suitable for long-horizon prediction. We build upon overshooting methods used to train other prediction models and recover a novel variational learning objective. Further, we use RO to extend another objective that acts as a surrog... |
Freyja: A Full Multirotor System for Agile & Precise Outdoor Flights | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562076/ | [
"Ajay Shankar",
"Sebastian Elbaum",
"Carrick Detweiler",
"Ajay Shankar",
"Sebastian Elbaum",
"Carrick Detweiler"
] | Several independent approaches exist for state estimation and control of multirotor unmanned aerial systems (UASs) that address specific and constrained operational conditions. This work presents a complete end-to-end pipeline that enables precise, aggressive and agile maneuvers for multirotor UASs under real and challenging outdoor environments. We leverage state-of-the-art optimal methods from t... |
Optimizing Part Placement for Improving Accuracy of Robot-Based Additive Manufacturing | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561494/ | [
"Prahar M. Bhatt",
"Ashish Kulkarni",
"Rishi K. Malhan",
"Satyandra K. Gupta",
"Prahar M. Bhatt",
"Ashish Kulkarni",
"Rishi K. Malhan",
"Satyandra K. Gupta"
] | Robotic manipulators are increasingly being used to perform additive manufacturing. The accuracy of a built part is dependent on the trajectory execution error of the manipulator. For articulated manipulators, the trajectory execution error and achievable build accuracy vary considerably over the workspace. Therefore, the build accuracy depends on where the part is placed in the manipulator worksp... |
Automated Mosquito Salivary Gland Extractor for PfSPZ-based Malaria Vaccine Production | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560959/ | [
"Wanze Li",
"Zhuohong He",
"Parth Vora",
"Yanzhou Wang",
"Balazs Vagvolgyi",
"Simon Leonard",
"Anna Goodridge",
"Iulian Iordachita",
"Stephen L. Hoffman",
"Sumana Chakravarty",
"Russell H. Taylor",
"Wanze Li",
"Zhuohong He",
"Parth Vora",
"Yanzhou Wang",
"Balazs Vagvolgyi",
"Simon Leonard",
"Anna Goodridge",
"Iulian Iordachita",
"Stephen L. Hoffman",
"Sumana Chakravarty",
"Russell H. Taylor"
] | Malaria is a worldwide scourge, and the broad deployment of an effective vaccine would improve the lives of millions of people. A vaccine based on Plasmodium falciparum (PfSPZ) sporozoites extracted from the salivary glands of infected mosquitoes shows significant promise. However, the large-scale industrial production of PfSPZ-based vaccines will benefit from automation of the key step of extract... |
An Artin Braid Group Representation of Knitting Machine State with Applications to Validation and Optimization of Fabrication Plans | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562113/ | [
"Jenny Lin",
"James McCann",
"Jenny Lin",
"James McCann"
] | Industrial knitting machines create fabric by manipulating loops held on hundreds of needles. A core problem in pattern making for these machines is transfer planning – coming up with a sequence of low-level operations that move loops to the appropriate needles so that knitting through those loops produces the correct final structure. Since each loop is connected to the larger piece in progress, t... |
Discriminative Asymmetric Learning for Efficient Surgical Instrument Parsing | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562078/ | [
"Jiaqi Liu",
"Yu Qiao",
"Jie Yang",
"Guang-Zhong Yang",
"Yun Gu",
"Jiaqi Liu",
"Yu Qiao",
"Jie Yang",
"Guang-Zhong Yang",
"Yun Gu"
] | Semantic segmentation of surgical instruments provides essential priors for autonomous surgery. This task is however challenging since the fine-structure of surgical instruments requires the accurate segmentation of detailed regions in images. As the visual guidance for autonomous surgery, the algorithm should also be real-time and friendly to embedded systems. In this paper, a discriminative asym... |
One to Many: Adaptive Instrument Segmentation via Meta Learning and Dynamic Online Adaptation in Robotic Surgical Video | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561690/ | [
"Zixu Zhao",
"Yueming Jin",
"Bo Lu",
"Chi-Fai Ng",
"Qi Dou",
"Yun-Hui Liu",
"Pheng-Ann Heng",
"Zixu Zhao",
"Yueming Jin",
"Bo Lu",
"Chi-Fai Ng",
"Qi Dou",
"Yun-Hui Liu",
"Pheng-Ann Heng"
] | Surgical instrument segmentation in robot-assisted surgery (RAS) - especially that using learning-based models - relies on the assumption that training and testing videos are sampled from the same domain. However, it is impractical and expensive to collect and annotate sufficient data from every new domain. To greatly increase the label efficiency, we explore a new problem, i.e., adaptive instrume... |
Target-targeted Domain Adaptation for Unsupervised Semantic Segmentation | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560785/ | [
"Xiaohong Zhang",
"Haofeng Zhang",
"Jianfeng Lu",
"Ling Shao",
"Jingyu Yang",
"Xiaohong Zhang",
"Haofeng Zhang",
"Jianfeng Lu",
"Ling Shao",
"Jingyu Yang"
] | Semantic segmentation has attracted increasing attention due to its important role in self-driving, and it is often realized by supervised learning with large number of well labeled maps. However, the labeled images are hard to be obtained in most circumstances, and the common way for unsupervised semantic segmentation is usually implemented by transferring the knowledge from source supervised dom... |
Point Cloud Segmentation via Edge-fused Local Graph Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560848/ | [
"Mengtao Han",
"Yaochen Li",
"Liangyu Zuo",
"Qiao Li",
"Chi Zhang",
"Yuanqi Su",
"Ping Li",
"Mengtao Han",
"Yaochen Li",
"Liangyu Zuo",
"Qiao Li",
"Chi Zhang",
"Yuanqi Su",
"Ping Li"
] | Traditional convolution for capturing local structures and relationships remains a key technical limit in 3D semantic segmentation, which neglects the certain influence of the adjacent points on the central point in the disordered local point clouds. In this paper, we propose a novel joint-edge graph convolution neural network (JEGCN), which can extract the dynamic features of each local area and ... |
Tightly-Coupled Multi-Sensor Fusion for Localization with LiDAR Feature Maps | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561547/ | [
"Liangliang Pan",
"Kaijin Ji",
"Ji Zhao",
"Liangliang Pan",
"Kaijin Ji",
"Ji Zhao"
] | Robust and accurate pose estimation in long-term localization is crucial to autonomous driving. In this paper, we dealt with absolute localization with a LiDAR feature map and multi-sensor measurements. We proposed a tightly-coupled fusion method with fixed-lag smoothing. A sliding window of recently maintained states is estimated by minimizing a joint cost function. This cost function includes re... |
Greedy-Based Feature Selection for Efficient LiDAR SLAM | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561262/ | [
"Jianhao Jiao",
"Yilong Zhu",
"Haoyang Ye",
"Huaiyang Huang",
"Peng Yun",
"Linxin Jiang",
"Lujia Wang",
"Ming Liu",
"Jianhao Jiao",
"Yilong Zhu",
"Haoyang Ye",
"Huaiyang Huang",
"Peng Yun",
"Linxin Jiang",
"Lujia Wang",
"Ming Liu"
] | Modern LiDAR-SLAM (L-SLAM) systems have shown excellent results in large-scale, real-world scenarios. However, they commonly have a high latency due to the expensive data association and nonlinear optimization. This paper demonstrates that actively selecting a subset of features significantly improves both the accuracy and efficiency of an L-SLAM system. We formulate the feature selection as a com... |
Retrieval and Localization with Observation Constraints | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560987/ | [
"Yuhao Zhou",
"Huanhuan Fan",
"Shuang Gao",
"Yuchen Yang",
"Xudong Zhang",
"Jijunnan Li",
"Yandong Guo",
"Yuhao Zhou",
"Huanhuan Fan",
"Shuang Gao",
"Yuchen Yang",
"Xudong Zhang",
"Jijunnan Li",
"Yandong Guo"
] | Accurate visual re-localization is very critical to many artificial intelligence applications, such as augmented reality, virtual reality, robotics and autonomous driving. To accomplish this task, we propose an integrated visual re-localization method called RLOCS by combining image retrieval, semantic consistency and geometry verification to achieve accurate estimations. The localization pipeline... |
An integrated approach for determining objects to be relocated and their goal positions inside clutter for object retrieval | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561282/ | [
"Jeeho Ahn",
"Jaeho Lee",
"Sang Hun Cheong",
"ChangHwan Kim",
"Changjoo Nam",
"Jeeho Ahn",
"Jaeho Lee",
"Sang Hun Cheong",
"ChangHwan Kim",
"Changjoo Nam"
] | We consider the problem of rearranging objects in a cluttered and confined space using a robotic manipulator. The goal is to retrieve a target object from the clutter where the target is occluded by other objects. In situations where overhand grasps are not allowed, the robot needs to remove some objects to make the target accessible. In the course of removing the objects, the robot also needs to ... |
A Hybrid Position/Force Controller for Joint Robots | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561279/ | [
"Shengwen Xie",
"Juan Ren",
"Shengwen Xie",
"Juan Ren"
] | In this paper, we present a hybrid position/force controller for operating joint robots. The hybrid controller has two goals—motion tracking and force regulating. As long as these two goals are not mutually exclusive, they can be decoupled in some way. In this work, we make use of the smooth and invertible mapping from the joint space to the task space to decouple the two control goals and design ... |
DIMSAN: Fast Exploration with the Synergy between Density-based Intrinsic Motivation and Self-adaptive Action Noise | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561740/ | [
"Jiayi Li",
"Boyao Li",
"Tao Lu",
"Ning Lu",
"Yinghao Cai",
"Shuo Wang",
"Jiayi Li",
"Boyao Li",
"Tao Lu",
"Ning Lu",
"Yinghao Cai",
"Shuo Wang"
] | Exploration in environments with sparse rewards remains a challenging problem in Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL). For the off-policy method, it usually needs a large number of training samples. With the growing dimensions of state and action space, this method becomes more and more sample-inefficient. In this paper, we propose a novel fast exploration method for off-policy reinforcement learning... |
Design and Testing of a Damped Piezo-Driven Decoupled XYZ Stage | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561583/ | [
"Zhong Chen",
"Junjie Shi",
"Songwei Zhu",
"Xineng Zhong",
"Xianmin Zhang",
"Zhong Chen",
"Junjie Shi",
"Songwei Zhu",
"Xineng Zhong",
"Xianmin Zhang"
] | Lightly-damped dynamics of a flexure-based mechanism will tend to largely deteriorate the broadband control performance if its hysteresis nonlinearity has been compensated. This paper developed a novel damped piezo-driven decoupled XYZ nanopositioning stage, which consists of three orthogonal parallel kinematic subchains, in which each subchain has a translational pair using a bridge-type piezo-dr... |
Innovative Design and Simulation of a Transformable Robot with Flexibility and Versatility, RHex-T3 | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561060/ | [
"Yue Lin",
"Yujia Tian",
"Yongjiang Xue",
"Shujun Han",
"Huaiyu Zhang",
"Wenxin Lai",
"Xuan Xiao",
"Yue Lin",
"Yujia Tian",
"Yongjiang Xue",
"Shujun Han",
"Huaiyu Zhang",
"Wenxin Lai",
"Xuan Xiao"
] | This paper presents a transformable RHex-inspired robot, RHex-T3, with high energy efficiency, excellent flexibility and versatility. By using the innovative 2-DoF transformable structure, RHex-T3 inherits most of RHex’s mobility, and can also switch to other 4 modes for handling various missions. The wheel-mode improves the efficiency of RHex-T3, and the leg-mode helps to generate a smooth locomo... |
A Variable Stiffness Actuator Based on Second-order Lever Mechanism and Its Manipulator Integration | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561932/ | [
"Zhangxing Liu",
"Hongzhe Jin",
"Hui Zhang",
"Yubin Liu",
"Yilin Long",
"Xiufang Liu",
"Jie Zhao",
"Zhangxing Liu",
"Hongzhe Jin",
"Hui Zhang",
"Yubin Liu",
"Yilin Long",
"Xiufang Liu",
"Jie Zhao"
] | This paper presents a new variable stiffness actuator based on a second-order lever mechanism which has wide stiffness regulation range. By employing a novel symmetric structure design and improving the load capacity of the stiffness regulation module, the proposed actuator also shows well performance in load capacity, stiffness regulation response, and elastic hysteresis. On this basis, a variabl... |
Robot Motion Planning with Human-Like Motion Patterns based on Human Arm Movement Primitive Chains | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560921/ | [
"Shiqiu Gong",
"Jing Zhao",
"Biyun Xie",
"Shiqiu Gong",
"Jing Zhao",
"Biyun Xie"
] | A novel motion planning method is proposed to generate human-like motion for anthropomorphic robot arms. Its highlight is to consider the robot arm to be human-like not only in its configuration but also in its motion patterns. To achieve this, the intrinsic mechanisms of human arm motion generation are transferred to robot motion planning. First, human arm motion is modeled using human arm motion... |
A Model-Free Synchronous Control of Humanoid Robot Finger | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560973/ | [
"Ziqi Liu",
"Li Jiang",
"Bin Yang",
"Chongyang Li",
"Ming Cheng",
"Shaowei Fan",
"Dapeng Yang",
"Ziqi Liu",
"Li Jiang",
"Bin Yang",
"Chongyang Li",
"Ming Cheng",
"Shaowei Fan",
"Dapeng Yang"
] | For a multi-fingered robot hand, the individual control over single joints cannot guarantee their fine collaboration. For achieving a high-precision synchronization, a theory of synchronous control is introduced to multi-fingered robot hands. This paper introduced a new model-free and cross-coupling control strategy. It had been tested on the humanoid robot fingers and showed high positioning perf... |
Generalized Point Set Registration with the Kent Distribution | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560824/ | [
"Zhe Min",
"Delong Zhu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Zhe Min",
"Delong Zhu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng"
] | Point set registration (PSR) is an essential problem in communities of computer vision, medical robotics and biomedical engineering. This paper is motivated by considering the anisotropic characteristics of the error values in estimating both the positional and orientational vectors from the PSs to be registered. To do this, the multi-variate Gaussian and Kent distributions are utilized to model t... |
Self-Supervised Learning for Monocular Depth Estimation on Minimally Invasive Surgery Scenes | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561508/ | [
"Shuwei Shao",
"Zhongcai Pei",
"Weihai Chen",
"Baochang Zhang",
"Xingming Wu",
"Dianmin Sun",
"David Doermann",
"Shuwei Shao",
"Zhongcai Pei",
"Weihai Chen",
"Baochang Zhang",
"Xingming Wu",
"Dianmin Sun",
"David Doermann"
] | Self-supervised learning algorithms that compute depth map from monocular videos have achieved remarkable performance on urban scenes and have been applied extensively. These techniques still face significant challenges, however, when applied directly to endoscopic videos because of the brightness variations from frame to frame and inadequate representation learning during the training phase. Insp... |
Reciprocally Rotating Magnetic Actuation and Automatic Trajectory Following for Wireless Capsule Endoscopy | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561833/ | [
"Yangxin Xu",
"Keyu Li",
"Ziqi Zhao",
"Fei Meng",
"Li Liu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Yangxin Xu",
"Keyu Li",
"Ziqi Zhao",
"Fei Meng",
"Li Liu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng"
] | Active wireless capsule endoscopy (WCE) under magnetic actuation is a promising technology to reduce the inspection time and relieve the burden of physicians. In this paper, we propose a reciprocally rotating magnetic actuation method for trajectory following of a capsule and develop its dynamic model. For the trajectory following task, we investigate the closed-loop tracking control strategies ba... |
Reduced Dynamics and Control for an Autonomous Bicycle | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560905/ | [
"Jiaming Xiong",
"Bo Li",
"Ruihan Yu",
"Daolin Ma",
"Wei Wang",
"Caishan Liu",
"Jiaming Xiong",
"Bo Li",
"Ruihan Yu",
"Daolin Ma",
"Wei Wang",
"Caishan Liu"
] | In this paper, we propose the reduced model for the full dynamics of a bicycle and analyze its nonlinear behavior under a proportional control law for steering. Based on the Gibbs-Appell equations for the Whipple bicycle, we obtain a second-order nonlinear ordinary differential equation (ODE) that governs the bicycle’s controlled motion. Two types of equilibrium points for the governing equation a... |
Balance Control of a Novel Wheel-legged Robot: Design and Experiments | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561579/ | [
"Shuai Wang",
"Leilei Cui",
"Jingfan Zhang",
"Jie Lai",
"Dongsheng Zhang",
"Ke Chen",
"Yu Zheng",
"Zhengyou Zhang",
"Zhong-Ping Jiang",
"Shuai Wang",
"Leilei Cui",
"Jingfan Zhang",
"Jie Lai",
"Dongsheng Zhang",
"Ke Chen",
"Yu Zheng",
"Zhengyou Zhang",
"Zhong-Ping Jiang"
] | This paper presents a balance control technique for a novel wheel-legged robot. We first derive a dynamic model of the robot and then apply a linear feedback controller based on output regulation and linear quadratic regulator (LQR) methods to maintain the standing of the robot on the ground without moving backward and forward mightily. To take into account nonlinearities of the model and obtain a... |
RGB Matters: Learning 7-DoF Grasp Poses on Monocular RGBD Images | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561409/ | [
"Minghao Gou",
"Hao-Shu Fang",
"Zhanda Zhu",
"Sheng Xu",
"Chenxi Wang",
"Cewu Lu",
"Minghao Gou",
"Hao-Shu Fang",
"Zhanda Zhu",
"Sheng Xu",
"Chenxi Wang",
"Cewu Lu"
] | General object grasping is an important yet unsolved problem in the field of robotics. Most of the current methods either generate grasp poses with few DoF that fail to cover most of the success grasps, or only take the unstable depth image or point cloud as input which may lead to poor results in some cases. In this paper, we propose RGBD-Grasp, a pipeline that solves this problem by decoupling 7... |
Hybrid Vision/Force Control for Interaction with the Bottle-like Object | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561039/ | [
"Lijun Han",
"Hesheng Wang",
"Weidong Chen",
"Jingchuan Wang",
"Jianjun Yuan",
"Lijun Han",
"Hesheng Wang",
"Weidong Chen",
"Jingchuan Wang",
"Jianjun Yuan"
] | This study proposes a hybrid vision/force control scheme for interaction with the inner surface of the bottle-like object. Based on the geometry of the object, a new generalized constraint called the bottleneck (BN) constraint is proposed, which ensures the tool passes through a fixed 3-D region and avoid collisions with the boundary of the region. To realize the hybrid vision/force control under ... |
REGNet: REgion-based Grasp Network for End-to-end Grasp Detection in Point Clouds | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561920/ | [
"Binglei Zhao",
"Hanbo Zhang",
"Xuguang Lan",
"Haoyu Wang",
"Zhiqiang Tian",
"Nanning Zheng",
"Binglei Zhao",
"Hanbo Zhang",
"Xuguang Lan",
"Haoyu Wang",
"Zhiqiang Tian",
"Nanning Zheng"
] | Reliable robotic grasping in unstructured environments is a crucial but challenging task. The main problem is to generate the optimal grasp of novel objects from partial noisy observations. This paper presents an end-to-end grasp detection network taking one single-view point cloud as input to tackle the problem. Our network includes three stages: Score Network (SN), Grasp Region Network (GRN), an... |
Elevation control of a soft jumping robot | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561676/ | [
"H. Chen",
"J. Liang",
"Z. Miao",
"G. Zhou",
"Y. Liu",
"M. Zhang",
"H. Chen",
"J. Liang",
"Z. Miao",
"G. Zhou",
"Y. Liu",
"M. Zhang"
] | Jumping with controllable elevation is significant for insect-scale robots to improve terrain adaptability and to escape from risks. However, jumping robots based on soft materials with low stiffness cannot transmit displacement precisely, exhibiting poor control of jumping. Here, we propose a modified two-bars catapult mechanism combined with an asynchronous sequential releasing strategy to reali... |
A Soft-Rigid Air-Propelled Pipe-Climbing Robot | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561321/ | [
"Qingxiang Zhao",
"Zhiyi Jiang",
"Henry K. Chu",
"Qingxiang Zhao",
"Zhiyi Jiang",
"Henry K. Chu"
] | Complex pipeline network should be inspected regularly for safety. In general, these tasks are often completed by large pipe-climbing robots or customized equipment. Most of them are not effective, and cannot work on pipes with uncertain barriers. Moreover, some pipes are mounted in constrained scenarios, so bulky robots are not applicable. This paper presents a tethered soft-rigid pipe-climbing r... |
Mechanical Intelligence for Adaptive Precision Grasp | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561457/ | [
"Qiujie Lu",
"Nicholas Baron",
"Guochao Bai",
"Nicolas Rojas",
"Qiujie Lu",
"Nicholas Baron",
"Guochao Bai",
"Nicolas Rojas"
] | Mechanical intelligence is the use of mechanical and other physical properties to create robotic systems adaptable to new external situations using simple control schemes. Designs of robot hands have successfully been developed and optimised following this principle to produce self-adaptive and versatile power grasps via implementations based on underactuated fingers, elastic components, and open-... |
Hierarchical Learning from Demonstrations for Long-Horizon Tasks | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561408/ | [
"Boyao Li",
"Jiayi Li",
"Tao Lu",
"Yinghao Cai",
"Shuo Wang",
"Boyao Li",
"Jiayi Li",
"Tao Lu",
"Yinghao Cai",
"Shuo Wang"
] | Although reinforcement learning (RL) has achieved great success in robotic manipulation skills learning, it is still challenging for long-horizon tasks. Combining RL with demonstrations is an effective solution. In this paper, we propose a novel hierarchical learning from demonstrations method for long-horizon tasks, which leverages (i) object-centered segmentation of demonstrations to automatical... |
Pylot: A Modular Platform for Exploring Latency-Accuracy Tradeoffs in Autonomous Vehicles | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561747/ | [
"Ionel Gog",
"Sukrit Kalra",
"Peter Schafhalter",
"Matthew A. Wright",
"Joseph E. Gonzalez",
"Ion Stoica",
"Ionel Gog",
"Sukrit Kalra",
"Peter Schafhalter",
"Matthew A. Wright",
"Joseph E. Gonzalez",
"Ion Stoica"
] | We present Pylot, a platform for autonomous vehicle (AV) research and development, built with the goal to allow researchers to study the effects of the latency and accuracy of their models and algorithms on the end-to-end driving behavior of an AV. This is achieved through a modular structure enabled by our high-performance dataflow system that represents AV software pipeline components (object de... |
Decentralized Circle Formation Control for Fish-like Robots in the Real-world via Reinforcement Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562019/ | [
"Tianhao Zhang",
"Yueheng Li",
"Shuai Li",
"Qiwei Ye",
"Chen Wang",
"Guangming Xie",
"Tianhao Zhang",
"Yueheng Li",
"Shuai Li",
"Qiwei Ye",
"Chen Wang",
"Guangming Xie"
] | In this paper, the circle formation control problem is addressed for a group of cooperative underactuated fish-like robots involving unknown nonlinear dynamics and disturbances. Based on the reinforcement learning and cognitive consistency theory, we propose a decentralized controller without the knowledge of the dynamics of the fish-like robots. The proposed controller can be transferred from sim... |
Distributed Rendezvous Control of Networked Uncertain Robotic Systems with Bearing Measurements | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561194/ | [
"Jianing Zhao",
"Hanjiang Hu",
"Keyi Zhu",
"Xiao Yu",
"Hesheng Wang",
"Jianing Zhao",
"Hanjiang Hu",
"Keyi Zhu",
"Xiao Yu",
"Hesheng Wang"
] | In this paper, the distributed rendezvous control problem of networked uncertain robotic systems with bearing measurements is investigated. The network topology of the multi-robot systems is described by an undirected graph. The dynamics of robots is modeled by Euler-Lagrange equation with unknown inertial parameters, which is more general than simple kinematics considered in existing works on ren... |
Multi-Parameter Optimization for a Robust RGB-D SLAM System | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561538/ | [
"Yizhao Wang",
"Xiaoxiao Zhu",
"Guohan He",
"Qixin Cao",
"Yizhao Wang",
"Xiaoxiao Zhu",
"Guohan He",
"Qixin Cao"
] | SLAM systems can retrieve their metric scales and depth information using RGB-D cameras. However, limited by the sensing range and objects structure, RGB-D cameras can not always work well, resulting in failures sometimes. In this work, we present initialization and localization methods based on maximum-a-posteriori estimation. Our system endows monocular keypoints with valid depth values and intr... |
Invariant EKF based 2D Active SLAM with Exploration Task | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561951/ | [
"Mengya Xu",
"Yang Song",
"Yongbo Chen",
"Shoudong Huang",
"Qi Hao",
"Mengya Xu",
"Yang Song",
"Yongbo Chen",
"Shoudong Huang",
"Qi Hao"
] | Right invariant extended Kalman filter (RIEKF) based simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) proposed recently has shown to be able to produce more consistent SLAM estimates as compared with traditional EKF based SLAM methods, including some improved EKF SLAM methods such as observability constrained-EKF (OC-EKF) SLAM. Latest results have demonstrated that its performance is very close to opt... |
MRPB 1.0: A Unified Benchmark for the Evaluation of Mobile Robot Local Planning Approaches | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561901/ | [
"Jian Wen",
"Xuebo Zhang",
"Qingchen Bi",
"Zhangchao Pan",
"Yanghe Feng",
"Jing Yuan",
"Yongchun Fang",
"Jian Wen",
"Xuebo Zhang",
"Qingchen Bi",
"Zhangchao Pan",
"Yanghe Feng",
"Jing Yuan",
"Yongchun Fang"
] | Local planning is one of the key technologies for mobile robots to achieve full autonomy and has been widely investigated. To evaluate mobile robot local planning approaches in a unified and comprehensive way, a mobile robot local planning benchmark called MRPB 1.0 is newly proposed in this paper. The benchmark facilitates both motion planning researchers who want to compare the performance of a n... |
Belief Space Partitioning for Symbolic Motion Planning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561121/ | [
"Mengxue Hou",
"Tony X. Lin",
"Haomin Zhou",
"Wei Zhang",
"Catherine R. Edwards",
"Fumin Zhang",
"Mengxue Hou",
"Tony X. Lin",
"Haomin Zhou",
"Wei Zhang",
"Catherine R. Edwards",
"Fumin Zhang"
] | We propose a memory-constrained partition-based method to extract symbolic representations of the belief state and its dynamics in order to solve planning problems in a partially observable Markov decision process (POMDP). Our K-means partitioning strategy uses a fixed number of symbols to represent the partitions of the belief space and ensures the parameterization of the belief dynamics does not... |
Anticipatory Planning and Dynamic Lost Person Models for Human-Robot Search and Rescue | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562070/ | [
"Larkin Heintzman",
"Amanda Hashimoto",
"Nicole Abaid",
"Ryan K. Williams",
"Larkin Heintzman",
"Amanda Hashimoto",
"Nicole Abaid",
"Ryan K. Williams"
] | In this work, we consider the problem of planning paths for a team of autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to assist search and rescue practitioners. To address the problem, we develop a fully integrated framework that includes information from all aspects of the search environment. We take into consideration lost person motion via a behavior-based predictive model, anticipated human searche... |
IMU Data Processing For Inertial Aided Navigation: A Recurrent Neural Network Based Approach | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561172/ | [
"Ming Zhang",
"Mingming Zhang",
"Yiming Chen",
"Mingyang Li",
"Ming Zhang",
"Mingming Zhang",
"Yiming Chen",
"Mingyang Li"
] | In this work, we propose a novel method for performing inertial aided navigation, by using deep neural net-works (DNNs). To date, most DNN inertial navigation methods focus on the task of inertial odometry, by taking gyroscope and accelerometer readings as input and regressing for integrated IMU poses (i.e., position and orientation). While this design has been successfully applied on a number of ... |
Highly Efficient Line Segment Tracking with an IMU-KLT Prediction and a Convex Geometric Distance Minimization | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560931/ | [
"Hao Wei",
"Fulin Tang",
"Chaofan Zhang",
"Yihong Wu",
"Hao Wei",
"Fulin Tang",
"Chaofan Zhang",
"Yihong Wu"
] | Line segment features become popular in SLAM community. Usually, line-based SLAM systems utilize local appearance descriptors for line segment tracking. However, traditional descriptor-based line segment tracking algorithms suffer from the problem that accuracy and speed cannot be possessed simultaneously, which affects the performance of line-based SLAM systems negatively. We propose a novel line... |
Robust localization for planar moving robot in changing environment: A perspective on density of correspondence and depth | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561539/ | [
"Yanmei Jiao",
"Lilu Liu",
"Bo Fu",
"Xiaqing Ding",
"Minhang Wang",
"Yue Wang",
"Rong Xiong",
"Yanmei Jiao",
"Lilu Liu",
"Bo Fu",
"Xiaqing Ding",
"Minhang Wang",
"Yue Wang",
"Rong Xiong"
] | Visual localization for planar moving robot is important to various indoor service robotic applications. To handle the textureless areas and frequent human activities in indoor environments, a novel robust visual localization algorithm which leverages dense correspondence and sparse depth for planar moving robot is proposed. The key component is a minimal solution which computes the absolute camer... |
IMU/Vehicle Calibration and Integrated Localization for Autonomous Driving | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560767/ | [
"Zhenbo Liu",
"Leijie Wang",
"Feng Wen",
"Hongbo Zhang",
"Zhenbo Liu",
"Leijie Wang",
"Feng Wen",
"Hongbo Zhang"
] | The localization system, which outputs vehicle position, velocity, and attitude, is one of the fundamental components in the autonomous driving vehicle. The global pose is not only used for the planning and control system, but also an important reference for the cloud source-based HD Map building and updating. The accuracy, availability, and reliability are key requirements for the localization sy... |
Developing of A Rigid-Compliant Finger Joint Exoskeleton Using Topology Optimization Method | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560753/ | [
"Renghao Liang",
"Guanghua Xu",
"Bo He",
"Min Li",
"Zhicheng Teng",
"Sicong Zhang",
"Renghao Liang",
"Guanghua Xu",
"Bo He",
"Min Li",
"Zhicheng Teng",
"Sicong Zhang"
] | Robotic hand exoskeletons can provide assistance to people who suffer from hand functional disability or spinal cord injury (SCI). However, the current hand exoskeletons remain challenging with respect to having a user-friendly design that satisfies human motion with a lightweight structure. Here we propose a method of using topology optimization in the design of finger exoskeletons, which is a li... |
SpringExo, a spring-based exoskeleton for providing knee assistance: Design, Characterization and Feasibility Study | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560775/ | [
"Dongbao Sui",
"Biing-Chwen Chang",
"Rand Hidayah",
"Yanhe Zhu",
"Sunil K. Agrawal",
"Dongbao Sui",
"Biing-Chwen Chang",
"Rand Hidayah",
"Yanhe Zhu",
"Sunil K. Agrawal"
] | This paper presents the design and preliminary evaluation of a portable spring-based knee exoskeleton, the SpringExo, which is designed to provide assistance to the leg while minimizing interference with the natural leg movement. Traditional rigid exoskeletons are unable to accurately align with a user’s anatomical joints. In addition, the user’s natural motion pattern is likely to change due to t... |
Robust Motion Averaging under Maximum Correntropy Criterion | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561406/ | [
"Jihua Zhu",
"Jie Hu",
"Huimin Lu",
"Badong Chen",
"Zhongyu Li",
"Yaochen Li",
"Jihua Zhu",
"Jie Hu",
"Huimin Lu",
"Badong Chen",
"Zhongyu Li",
"Yaochen Li"
] | Recently, the motion averaging method has been introduced as an effective means to solve the multi-view registration problem. This method aims to recover global motions from a set of relative motions, where the original method is sensitive to outliers due to using the Frobenius norm error in the optimization. Accordingly, this paper proposes a novel robust motion averaging method based on the maxi... |
Robust Semantic Map Matching Algorithm Based on Probabilistic Registration Model | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561176/ | [
"Qingxiang Zhang",
"Meiling Wang",
"Yufeng Yue",
"Qingxiang Zhang",
"Meiling Wang",
"Yufeng Yue"
] | The matching and fusing of local maps generated by multiple robots can greatly enhance the performance of relative localization and collaborative mapping. Currently, existing semantic matching methods are partly based on classical iterative closet point (ICP), which typically fail in cases with large initial error. What’s more, current semantic matching algorithms have high computation complexity ... |
Accurate and Robust Scale Recovery for Monocular Visual Odometry Based on Plane Geometry | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561215/ | [
"Rui Tian",
"Yunzhou Zhang",
"Delong Zhu",
"Shiwen Liang",
"Sonya Coleman",
"Dermot Kerr",
"Rui Tian",
"Yunzhou Zhang",
"Delong Zhu",
"Shiwen Liang",
"Sonya Coleman",
"Dermot Kerr"
] | Scale ambiguity is a fundamental problem in monocular visual odometry. Typical solutions include loop closure detection and environment information mining. For applications like self-driving cars, loop closure is not always available, hence mining prior knowledge from the environment becomes a more promising approach. In this paper, with the assumption of a constant height of the camera above the ... |
Viko: An Adaptive Gecko Gripper with Vision-based Tactile Sensor | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561606/ | [
"Chohei Pang",
"Kinwing Mak",
"Yazhan Zhang",
"Yang Yang",
"Yu Alexander Tse",
"Michael Yu Wang",
"Chohei Pang",
"Kinwing Mak",
"Yazhan Zhang",
"Yang Yang",
"Yu Alexander Tse",
"Michael Yu Wang"
] | Monitoring the state of contact is essential for robotic devices, especially grippers that implement geckoinspired adhesives where intimate contact is crucial for a firm attachment. However, due to the lack of deformable sensors, few have demonstrated tactile sensing for gecko grippers. We present Viko, an adaptive gecko gripper that utilizes vision-based tactile sensors to monitor contact state. ... |
POIS: Policy-Oriented Instance Segmentation for Ambidextrous Robot Picking | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562045/ | [
"Guangyun Xu",
"Yi Tao",
"Bowen Jiang",
"Peng Wang",
"Yongkang Luo",
"Jun Zhong",
"Guangyun Xu",
"Yi Tao",
"Bowen Jiang",
"Peng Wang",
"Yongkang Luo",
"Jun Zhong"
] | Robots with a parallel-jaw gripper and suction cup is an adaptive and efficient robotic picking system. This paper proposed Policy-Oriented Instance Segmentation (POIS) for ambidextrous robots. POIS can generate a pair of target masks that allows ambidextrous robots to pick in parallel. It takes a depth image and predicts initial mask, center offset, and policy confidence map through three paralle... |
Thrust Enhancement of Wave-driven Unmanned Surface Vehicle by using Asymmetric Foil | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560930/ | [
"Yan Gao",
"Lyucheng Xie",
"Tin Lun Lam",
"Yan Gao",
"Lyucheng Xie",
"Tin Lun Lam"
] | In the Wave-driven unmanned surface vehicles (WUSVs), oscillating-foils are the most straightforward and widely used wave energy conversion mechanism. In this paper, a kind of novel asymmetric foil is proposed, which improves the wave energy-converting efficiency to provide a more significant thrust in every wave cycle. We break down the movement of the foils in the wave and build the correspondin... |
Conquering Textureless with RF-referenced Monocular Vision for MAV State Estimation | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560744/ | [
"Shengkai Zhang",
"Sheyang Tang",
"Wei Wang",
"Tao Jiang",
"Qian Zhang",
"Shengkai Zhang",
"Sheyang Tang",
"Wei Wang",
"Tao Jiang",
"Qian Zhang"
] | The versatile nature of agile micro aerial vehicles (MAVs) poses fundamental challenges to the design of robust state estimation in various complex environments. Achieving high-quality performance in textureless scenes is one of the missing pieces in the puzzle. Previously proposed solutions either seek a remedy with visual loop closure or leverage RF localizability with inferior accuracy. None of... |
Control of an Aerial Manipulator Using a Quadrotor with a Replaceable Robotic Arm | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560827/ | [
"Zizhen Ouyang",
"Ruidong Mei",
"Zisen Liu",
"Mingxin Wei",
"Zida Zhou",
"Hui Cheng",
"Zizhen Ouyang",
"Ruidong Mei",
"Zisen Liu",
"Mingxin Wei",
"Zida Zhou",
"Hui Cheng"
] | Control of an aerial manipulator is challenging due to the decentralized dynamics of the aerial vehicle and the robotic arm. It is generally complex to adjust the controller of the aerial manipulator when replacing a different robotic arm. This paper presents a flexible control scheme for a quadrotor-based aerial manipulator equipped with a replaceable robotic arm. To analyze the dynamic character... |
A Real-Time Multi-Task Framework for Guidewire Segmentation and Endpoint Localization in Endovascular Interventions | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560838/ | [
"Yan-Jie Zhou",
"Shi-Qi Liu",
"Xiao-Liang Xie",
"Xiao-Hu Zhou",
"Guan-An Wang",
"Zeng-Guang Hou",
"Rui-Qi Li",
"Zhen-Liang Ni",
"Chen-Chen Fan",
"Yan-Jie Zhou",
"Shi-Qi Liu",
"Xiao-Liang Xie",
"Xiao-Hu Zhou",
"Guan-An Wang",
"Zeng-Guang Hou",
"Rui-Qi Li",
"Zhen-Liang Ni",
"Chen-Chen Fan"
] | Real-time guidewire segmentation and endpoint localization play a pivotal role in robot-assisted minimally invasive surgery, which is helpful to reduce radiation dose and procedure time. Nevertheless, the tasks often come with the challenge of limited computational resources. For this purpose, a real-time multi-task framework with two stages is developed. In the first stage, a Fast Attention-fused... |
Towards Adjoint Sensing and Acting Schemes and Interleaving Task Planning for Robust Robot Plan | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561756/ | [
"Shuo Yang",
"Xinjun Mao",
"Shuo Wang",
"Huaiyu Xiao",
"Yuanzhou Xue",
"Shuo Yang",
"Xinjun Mao",
"Shuo Wang",
"Huaiyu Xiao",
"Yuanzhou Xue"
] | Robots operating in open environments expect to have robust plans to achieve tasks successfully under environment uncertainties. However, both partial observability and dynamics of environment states have significantly decreased the robustness of task achievement, making robot task planning much more challenging. The partially observable states require the robot to obtain observations for optimall... |
Autonomous Multi-View Navigation via Deep Reinforcement Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561631/ | [
"Xueqin Huang",
"Wei Chen",
"Wei Zhang",
"Ran Song",
"Jiyu Cheng",
"Yibin Li",
"Xueqin Huang",
"Wei Chen",
"Wei Zhang",
"Ran Song",
"Jiyu Cheng",
"Yibin Li"
] | In this paper, we propose a novel deep reinforcement learning (DRL) system for the autonomous navigation of mobile robots that consists of three modules: map navigation, multi-view perception and multi-branch control. Our DRL system takes as the input a routed map provided by a global planner and three RGB images captured by a multi-camera setup to gather global and local information, respectively... |
A Multi-spectral Dataset for Evaluating Motion Estimation Systems | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561906/ | [
"Weichen Dai",
"Yu Zhang",
"Shenzhou Chen",
"Donglei Sun",
"Da Kong",
"Weichen Dai",
"Yu Zhang",
"Shenzhou Chen",
"Donglei Sun",
"Da Kong"
] | Visible images have been widely used for motion estimation. Thermal images, in contrast, are more challenging to be used in motion estimation since they typically have lower resolution, less texture, and more noise. In this paper, a novel dataset for evaluating the performance of multi-spectral motion estimation systems is presented. All the sequences are recorded from a handheld multi-spectral de... |
PicoVO: A Lightweight RGB-D Visual Odometry Targeting Resource-Constrained IoT Devices | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561285/ | [
"Yuquan He",
"Ying Wang",
"Cheng Liu",
"Lei Zhang",
"Yuquan He",
"Ying Wang",
"Cheng Liu",
"Lei Zhang"
] | Ego-motion estimation with 3D perception using visual odometry (VO) is known to be robust and economical among the existing odometry techniques. However, existing VO solutions are typically both computation intensive and memory intensive, which dramatically inhibits their deployment in IoT platforms such as robotic vehicles and handheld devices mostly equipped with resource-constrained MCU-level p... |
3D Surfel Map-Aided Visual Relocalization with Learned Descriptors | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561005/ | [
"Haoyang Ye",
"Huaiyang Huang",
"Marco Hutter",
"Timothy Sandy",
"Ming Liu",
"Haoyang Ye",
"Huaiyang Huang",
"Marco Hutter",
"Timothy Sandy",
"Ming Liu"
] | In this paper, we introduce a method for visual relocalization using the geometric information from a 3D surfel map. A visual database is first built by global indices from the 3D surfel map rendering, which provides associations between image points and 3D surfels. Surfel reprojection constraints are utilized to optimize the keyframe poses and map points in the visual database. A hierarchical cam... |
Vision-based Path Following of Snake-like Robots | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561468/ | [
"Lixing Liu",
"Wei Xi",
"Xian Guo",
"Yongchun Fang",
"Lixing Liu",
"Wei Xi",
"Xian Guo",
"Yongchun Fang"
] | Due to the head swinging and the body winding, the self-localization and path following for snake-like robots based on vision are very challenging. In this paper, a novel pantilt compensation method and curve parameter compensation path following controller are proposed to solve these problems, which can achieve high-precision path following. More specifically, to realize real-time positioning of ... |
Configuration Transformation of the Wheel-Legged Robot Using Inverse Dynamics Control | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560781/ | [
"Haitao Zhou",
"Haoyang Yu",
"Xu Li",
"Haibo Feng",
"Songyuan Zhang",
"Yili Fu",
"Haitao Zhou",
"Haoyang Yu",
"Xu Li",
"Haibo Feng",
"Songyuan Zhang",
"Yili Fu"
] | In this paper, the configuration transformation of Wheel-Legged Robot (WLR) is studied, which can enable the robot to change its multilinks configuration on Inverted Equilibrium Manifold (IEM), while keeping balance with a small location drift on the floor. First of all, the general form of dynamics equation of planar Articulated Wheeled Inverted Pendulum (AWIP) with a wheel and n − 1 rigid links,... |
A Passive Hydraulic Auxiliary System Designed for Increasing Legged Robot Payload and Efficiency | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561581/ | [
"Wu Fan",
"Tao Liu",
"Jingang Yi",
"Xinyan Huang",
"Bin Zhang",
"Xiufeng Zhang",
"Shuoyu Wang",
"Wu Fan",
"Tao Liu",
"Jingang Yi",
"Xinyan Huang",
"Bin Zhang",
"Xiufeng Zhang",
"Shuoyu Wang"
] | Load-carrying capability is an essential criterion in legged robots' practical application. This paper proposes an unpowered hydraulic auxiliary system to improve the legged robot's loading capability and energy efficiency. For humans, it has been widely hypothesized that intra-abdominal pressure can reduce potential injurious compressive force imposed on spinal discs when a person lifts heavy obj... |
Legged Robot State Estimation in Slippery Environments Using Invariant Extended Kalman Filter with Velocity Update | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561313/ | [
"Sangli Teng",
"Mark Wilfried Mueller",
"Koushil Sreenath",
"Sangli Teng",
"Mark Wilfried Mueller",
"Koushil Sreenath"
] | This paper proposes a state estimator for legged robots operating in slippery environments. An Invariant Extended Kalman Filter (InEKF) is implemented to fuse inertial and velocity measurements from a tracking camera and leg kinematic constraints. The misalignment between the camera and the robot-frame is also modeled thus enabling auto-calibration of camera pose. The leg kinematics based velocity... |
Multi-target Coverage with Connectivity Maintenance using Knowledge-incorporated Policy Framework | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562017/ | [
"Shiguang Wu",
"Zhiqiang Pu",
"Zhen Liu",
"Tenghai Qiu",
"Jianqiang Yi",
"Tianle Zhang",
"Shiguang Wu",
"Zhiqiang Pu",
"Zhen Liu",
"Tenghai Qiu",
"Jianqiang Yi",
"Tianle Zhang"
] | This paper considers a multi-target coverage problem where a robot team aims to efficiently cover multi-targets while maintaining connectivity in a distributed manner. A novel knowledge-incorporated policy framework is proposed to derive a distributed, efficient, and connectivity guaranteed coverage policy. In particular, a knowledge-guided policy network (KGPnet) is designed, which consists of ob... |
SMMR-Explore: SubMap-based Multi-Robot Exploration System with Multi-robot Multi-target Potential Field Exploration Method | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561328/ | [
"Jincheng Yu",
"Jianming Tong",
"Yuanfan Xu",
"Zhilin Xu",
"Haolin Dong",
"Tianxiang Yang",
"Yu Wang",
"Jincheng Yu",
"Jianming Tong",
"Yuanfan Xu",
"Zhilin Xu",
"Haolin Dong",
"Tianxiang Yang",
"Yu Wang"
] | Collaborative exploration in an unknown environment without external positioning under limited communication is an essential task for multi-robot applications. For inter-robot positioning, various Distributed Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (DSLAM) systems share the Place Recognition (PR) descriptors and sensor data to estimate the relative pose between robots and merge robots’ maps. As maps... |
Multi-objective Conflict-based Search for Multi-agent Path Finding | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560985/ | [
"Zhongqiang Ren",
"Sivakumar Rathinam",
"Howie Choset",
"Zhongqiang Ren",
"Sivakumar Rathinam",
"Howie Choset"
] | Conventional multi-agent path planners typically compute an ensemble of paths while optimizing a single objective, such as path length. However, many applications may require multiple objectives, say fuel consumption and completion time, to be simultaneously optimized during planning and these criteria may not be readily compared and sometimes lie in competition with each other. Naively applying e... |
Remote-Center-of-Motion Recommendation toward Brain Needle Intervention Using Deep Reinforcement Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560747/ | [
"Huxin Gao",
"Xiao Xiao",
"Liang Qiu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Nicolas Kon Kam King",
"Hongliang Ren",
"Huxin Gao",
"Xiao Xiao",
"Liang Qiu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Nicolas Kon Kam King",
"Hongliang Ren"
] | Brain needle intervention is a specific diagnosis and therapy procedure in brain disorders, such as brain tumors and Parkinson’s disease. Preoperative needle path planning is a vital step to guarantee the patient’s safety and reduce lesions. For positioning accuracy in the CT/MRI environment, we have developed a novel needle intervention robot in our previous work. Because the robot is currently d... |
Autonomous Navigation of an Ultrasound Probe Towards Standard Scan Planes with Deep Reinforcement Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561295/ | [
"Keyu Li",
"Jian Wang",
"Yangxin Xu",
"Hao Qin",
"Dongsheng Liu",
"Li Liu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Keyu Li",
"Jian Wang",
"Yangxin Xu",
"Hao Qin",
"Dongsheng Liu",
"Li Liu",
"Max Q.-H. Meng"
] | Autonomous ultrasound (US) acquisition is an important yet challenging task, as it involves interpretation of the highly complex and variable images and their spatial relationships. In this work, we propose a deep reinforcement learning framework to autonomously control the 6-D pose of a virtual US probe based on real-time image feedback to navigate towards the standard scan planes under the restr... |
A Knowledge-Based Fast Motion Planning Method Through Online Environmental Feature Learning | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561684/ | [
"Yuan Yuan",
"Jie Liu",
"Jiankun Wang",
"Wenzheng Chi",
"Guodong Chen",
"Lining Sun",
"Yuan Yuan",
"Jie Liu",
"Jiankun Wang",
"Wenzheng Chi",
"Guodong Chen",
"Lining Sun"
] | The sampling-based partial motion planning algorithm has come into widespread application in dynamic mobile robot navigation due to its low calculation costs and excellent performance in avoiding obstacles. However, when confronted with complicated scenarios, the motion planning algorithms are easily caught in traps. In order to solve this problem, this paper proposes a knowledge-based fast motion... |
Modeling and Control of an Untethered Magnetic Gripper | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561882/ | [
"Yunxuan Mao",
"Sishen Yuan",
"Jiaole Wang",
"Jinmin Zhang",
"Shuang Song",
"Yunxuan Mao",
"Sishen Yuan",
"Jiaole Wang",
"Jinmin Zhang",
"Shuang Song"
] | Small-scale robots have great potential in minimally invasive surgery (MIS). In this paper, we propose an untethered magnetic gripper with small scale and build a double-magnet model for it. The gripper is 4.3mm long and its maximum width is 4mm. It contains a spindle and two magnets, which can achieve precise control of orientation, position and open angle with external magnetic driven field. As ... |
A Flexible Magnetic Field Mapping Model For Calibration of Magnetic Manipulation System | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561421/ | [
"Yi Xing",
"Yanchao Jia",
"Zhen Zhan",
"Jianjie Li",
"Chengzhi Hu",
"Yi Xing",
"Yanchao Jia",
"Zhen Zhan",
"Jianjie Li",
"Chengzhi Hu"
] | Magnetic manipulation provides a versatile, remote, noninvasive, and cost-effective strategy in a variety of applications. Till now, many different configurations of magnetic manipulation systems have been developed to address different needs on force, torque, accuracy, and accessibilities. Magnetic field mapping can help to explore the exact map of the magnetic field in the working space and guar... |
Dynamic tracking for microrobot with active magnetic sensor array | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561854/ | [
"Min Wang",
"Kwan Yi Leung",
"Rui Liu",
"Shuang Song",
"Yixuan Yuan",
"Jianqin Yin",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Jun Liu",
"Min Wang",
"Kwan Yi Leung",
"Rui Liu",
"Shuang Song",
"Yixuan Yuan",
"Jianqin Yin",
"Max Q.-H. Meng",
"Jun Liu"
] | Accurate position feedback in a wide range is critical for medical microrobotics and robot-assisted examinations, such as colonoscopy, bronchoscopy and capsule endoscopy examination. Among the many modalities of positioning feedback, magnetic tracking is a preferable method due to the unique advantages of free line of sight, free energy storage and untethered connection. However, the field strengt... |
Design and Experimental Validation of a Robotic System for Reactor Core Detector Removal | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560847/ | [
"Zhe Han",
"Huanyu Tian",
"Fansheng Meng",
"Hao Wen",
"Rui Ma",
"Xingguang Duan",
"Yilin Zhang",
"Chenghua Liu",
"Zhe Han",
"Huanyu Tian",
"Fansheng Meng",
"Hao Wen",
"Rui Ma",
"Xingguang Duan",
"Yilin Zhang",
"Chenghua Liu"
] | The reactor power and the coolant level in the nuclear plant are monitored via the reactor core detectors. Every 4 to 5 years, the detectors with high-level radiation need to be removed, which is time-consuming and hazardous for workers. To address this issue, this paper introduces a novel robotic system and its strategy for the removal of the detectors. The modular mechanisms are designed to achi... |
Accurate and Robust Stereo Direct Visual Odometry for Agricultural Environment | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561074/ | [
"Tao Yu",
"Junwei Zhou",
"Liangliang Wang",
"Shengwu Xiong",
"Tao Yu",
"Junwei Zhou",
"Liangliang Wang",
"Shengwu Xiong"
] | Vision-based localization and mapping in the agricultural environment is challenging due to the unstructured scene with unstable features, illumination variations, bumpy roads, and dynamic environmental objects. To address these challenges, we propose an accurate and robust stereo direct visual odometry system with modifications on Stereo-DSO. We firstly select some well-matched static stereo poin... |
A Cascaded LiDAR-Camera Fusion Network for Road Detection | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561935/ | [
"Shuo Gu",
"Jian Yang",
"Hui Kong",
"Shuo Gu",
"Jian Yang",
"Hui Kong"
] | Most of the existing road detection methods are either single-modal based, e.g., based on LiDAR or camera, or multi-modal based with LiDAR-camera fusion. The algorithms are designed for a specific data type, and cannot cope with input data changes. In addition, the LiDAR-camera based methods can only work in day time with enough light. In this paper, we develop a novel LiDAR-camera fusion strategy... |
Design and Analysis of a Novel Lightweight, Versatile Soft-rigid Robot | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561811/ | [
"Yongyao Li",
"Ming Congr",
"Dong Liu",
"Yu Du",
"Yongyao Li",
"Ming Congr",
"Dong Liu",
"Yu Du"
] | Soft robots are compliant to wrap large objects and adaptive to unstructured environments, while rigid robots can bend discretely at joints and pinch small objects easily. In this paper, we aim to create a novel robot that can behave like a rigid or soft robot adaptively, without additional stiffness-tunable mechanism. This approach makes the robot lightweight and practical. First, we present the ... |
Kinetostatics for variable cross-section continuum manipulators | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561795/ | [
"Han Yuan",
"Zuan Li",
"Wenfu Xu",
"Han Yuan",
"Zuan Li",
"Wenfu Xu"
] | Continuum manipulators have shown a wide range of applications due to their inherent compliance and dexterity. At present, the cross-sectional dimension of these manipulators is often kept constant, which facilitates the design, fabrication and modeling processes. The famous piecewise-constant-curvature (PCC) assumption is widely used in the kinematics and motion control. By contrast, most natural... |
Numerical Simulation of an Untethered Omni-Directional Star-Shaped Swimming Robot | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561301/ | [
"Xiaonan Huang",
"Weicheng Huang",
"Zachary Patterson",
"Zhijian Ren",
"M. Khalid Jawed",
"Carmel Majidi",
"Xiaonan Huang",
"Weicheng Huang",
"Zachary Patterson",
"Zhijian Ren",
"M. Khalid Jawed",
"Carmel Majidi"
] | Simulating the swimming of soft underwater robot remains challenging due to the absence of an efficient numerical framework that can effectively capture the geometrically nonlinear deformation of soft materials and structures when interacting with a liquid environment. Here, we address this by introducing a discrete differential geometry-based model that incorporates an implicit treatment of the e... |
NeuralSim: Augmenting Differentiable Simulators with Neural Networks | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560935/ | [
"Eric Heiden",
"David Millard",
"Erwin Coumans",
"Yizhou Sheng",
"Gaurav S. Sukhatme",
"Eric Heiden",
"David Millard",
"Erwin Coumans",
"Yizhou Sheng",
"Gaurav S. Sukhatme"
] | Differentiable simulators provide an avenue for closing the sim-to-real gap by enabling the use of efficient, gradient-based optimization algorithms to find the simulation parameters that best fit the observed sensor readings. Nonetheless, these analytical models can only predict the dynamical behavior of systems for which they have been designed. In this work, we study the augmentation of a novel... |
Continuous Transition: Improving Sample Efficiency for Continuous Control Problems via MixUp | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561137/ | [
"Junfan Lin",
"Zhongzhan Huang",
"Keze Wang",
"Xiaodan Liang",
"Weiwei Chen",
"Liang Lin",
"Junfan Lin",
"Zhongzhan Huang",
"Keze Wang",
"Xiaodan Liang",
"Weiwei Chen",
"Liang Lin"
] | Although deep reinforcement learning (RL) has been successfully applied to a variety of robotic control tasks, it’s still challenging to apply it to real-world tasks, due to the poor sample efficiency. Attempting to overcome this shortcoming, several works focus on reusing the collected trajectory data during the training by decomposing them into a set of policy-irrelevant discrete transitions. Ho... |
Effective Crash Recovery of Robot Software Programs in ROS | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560876/ | [
"Yong-Hao Zou",
"Jia-Ju Bai",
"Yong-Hao Zou",
"Jia-Ju Bai"
] | Modern robot systems use various software programs to autonomously perform different kinds of tasks. However, due to the risks of possible faults and errors, a robotic software program can inevitably crash in some cases, causing that the robot system fails to perform the current task. Thus, for robustness, the crashed program should be correctly recovered to continue the failed task. For this purp... |
Point Set Registration With Semantic Region Association Using Cascaded Expectation Maximization | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561140/ | [
"Lan Hu",
"Jiaxin Wei",
"Zhanpeng Ouyang",
"Laurent Kneip",
"Lan Hu",
"Jiaxin Wei",
"Zhanpeng Ouyang",
"Laurent Kneip"
] | We introduce a new solution to point set registration, a fundamental geometric problem occurring in many computer vision and robotics applications. We consider the specific case in which the point sets are segmented into semantically annotated parts. Such information may for example come from object detection or instance-level semantic segmentation in a registered RGB image. Existing methods incor... |
A Flexible and Efficient Loop Closure Detection Based on Motion Knowledge | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561126/ | [
"Bingxi Liu",
"Fulin Tang",
"Yujie Fu",
"Yanqun Yang",
"Yihong Wu",
"Bingxi Liu",
"Fulin Tang",
"Yujie Fu",
"Yanqun Yang",
"Yihong Wu"
] | Loop closure detection (LCD) is an essential module for simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), which can correct accumulated errors after long-term explorations. The widely used bag-of-words (BoW) model can not satisfy well the requirements of both low time consumption and high accuracy for a mobile platform. In this paper, we propose a novel LCD algorithm based on motion knowledge. We give... |
A Light-Weight Semantic Map for Visual Localization towards Autonomous Driving | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561663/ | [
"Tong Qin",
"Yuxin Zheng",
"Tongqing Chen",
"Yilun Chen",
"Qing Su",
"Tong Qin",
"Yuxin Zheng",
"Tongqing Chen",
"Yilun Chen",
"Qing Su"
] | Accurate localization is of crucial importance for autonomous driving tasks. Nowadays, we have seen a lot of sensor-rich vehicles (e.g. Robo-taxi) driving on the street autonomously, which rely on high-accurate sensors (e.g. Lidar and RTK GPS) and high-resolution map. However, low-cost production cars cannot afford such high expenses on sensors and maps. How to reduce costs? How do sensor-rich veh... |
Visual Semantic Localization based on HD Map for Autonomous Vehicles in Urban Scenarios | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561459/ | [
"Huayou Wang",
"Changliang Xue",
"Yanxing Zhou",
"Feng Wen",
"Hongbo Zhang",
"Huayou Wang",
"Changliang Xue",
"Yanxing Zhou",
"Feng Wen",
"Hongbo Zhang"
] | Highly accurate and robust localization ability is of great importance for autonomous vehicles (AVs) in urban scenarios. Traditional vision-based methods suffer from lost due to illumination, weather, viewing and appearance changes. In this paper we propose a novel visual semantic localization algorithm based on HD map and semantic features which are compact in representation. Semantic features ar... |
Hybrid Bird’s-Eye Edge Based Semantic Visual SLAM for Automated Valet Parking | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560900/ | [
"Zhenzhen Xiang",
"Anbo Bao",
"Jianbo Su",
"Zhenzhen Xiang",
"Anbo Bao",
"Jianbo Su"
] | Vision-based localization and mapping solution is promising to be adopted in the automated valet parking task. In this paper, a semantic SLAM framework that leverages the hybrid edge information on bird’s-eye view images is presented. To extract useful edges from the synthesized bird’s-eye view image and the free-space contours for the SLAM task, different segmentation methods are designed to remo... |
Collaborative Visual Inertial SLAM for Multiple Smart Phones | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561946/ | [
"Jialing Liu",
"Ruyu Liu",
"Kaiqi Chen",
"Jianhua Zhang",
"Dongyan Guo",
"Jialing Liu",
"Ruyu Liu",
"Kaiqi Chen",
"Jianhua Zhang",
"Dongyan Guo"
] | The efficiency and accuracy of mapping are crucial in a large scene and long-term AR applications. Multi-agent cooperative SLAM is the precondition of multi-user AR interaction. The cooperation of multiple smart phones has the potential to improve efficiency and robustness of task completion and can complete tasks that a single agent cannot do. However, it depends on robust communication, efficien... |
MS*: A New Exact Algorithm for Multi-agent Simultaneous Multi-goal Sequencing and Path Finding | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561779/ | [
"Zhongqiang Ren",
"Sivakumar Rathinam",
"Howie Choset",
"Zhongqiang Ren",
"Sivakumar Rathinam",
"Howie Choset"
] | In multi-agent applications such as surveillance and logistics, fleets of mobile agents are often expected to coordinate and safely visit a large number of goal locations as efficiently as possible. The multi-agent planning problem in these applications involves allocating and sequencing goals for each agent while simultaneously producing conflict-free paths for the agents. In this article, we int... |
Inertial Aided 3D LiDAR SLAM with Hybrid Geometric Primitives in Large-scale Environments | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561511/ | [
"Wen Chen",
"Hongchao Zhao",
"Qi Shen",
"Chao Xiong",
"Shunbo Zhou",
"Yun-Hui Liu",
"Wen Chen",
"Hongchao Zhao",
"Qi Shen",
"Chao Xiong",
"Shunbo Zhou",
"Yun-Hui Liu"
] | This paper presents a comprehensive inertial aided 3D LiDAR SLAM system with hybrid geometric primitives in large-scale environments, including a tightly-coupled LiDAR-Inertial-Odometry (LIO), a global mapping module supported by learning-based loop closure detection and a sub-maps matching algorithm. An efficient method is developed to simultaneously extract explicit plane features and point feat... |
Prediction-Based Reachability for Collision Avoidance in Autonomous Driving | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9560790/ | [
"Anjian Li",
"Liting Sun",
"Wei Zhan",
"Masayoshi Tomizuka",
"Mo Chen",
"Anjian Li",
"Liting Sun",
"Wei Zhan",
"Masayoshi Tomizuka",
"Mo Chen"
] | Safety is an important topic in autonomous driving since any collision may cause serious injury to people and damage to property. Hamilton-Jacobi (HJ) Reachability is a formal method that verifies safety in multi-agent interaction and provides a safety controller for collision avoidance. However, due to the worst-case assumption on the car’s future behaviours, reachability might result in too much... |
Lane-free Autonomous Intersection Management: A Batch-processing Framework Integrating Reservation-based and Planning-based Methods | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9562015/ | [
"Bai Li",
"Youmin Zhang",
"Tankut Acarman",
"Yakun Ouyang",
"Cagdas Yaman",
"Yaonan Wang",
"Bai Li",
"Youmin Zhang",
"Tankut Acarman",
"Yakun Ouyang",
"Cagdas Yaman",
"Yaonan Wang"
] | Autonomous intersection management (AIM) refers to planning the trajectories for multiple connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) when they traverse an unsignalized intersection cooperatively. As an extension of the conventional AIM, lane-free AIM allows the CAVs to adjust their velocities and paths flexibly within the intersection. Nominally, one needs to formulate a centralized optimal control p... |
Pheromone-Diffusion-based Conscientious Reactive Path Planning for Road Network Persistent Surveillance | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561707/ | [
"Tong Wang",
"Gangqi Dong",
"Panfeng Huang",
"Tong Wang",
"Gangqi Dong",
"Panfeng Huang"
] | Road Network Persistent Surveillance Problem (RPSP) involves path planning for an unmanned ground vehicle (UGV) with detection ability to timely detect the events randomly occurred. The road network is formed by edges and weighted viewpoints, where the UGV must move along the edges. The existing method based on cognitive architecture is inadequate in terms of real-time and effective decision makin... |
MDANet: Multi-Modal Deep Aggregation Network for Depth Completion | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561490/ | [
"Yanjie Ke",
"Kun Li",
"Wei Yang",
"Zhenbo Xu",
"Dayang Hao",
"Liusheng Huang",
"Gang Wang",
"Yanjie Ke",
"Kun Li",
"Wei Yang",
"Zhenbo Xu",
"Dayang Hao",
"Liusheng Huang",
"Gang Wang"
] | Depth completion aims to recover the dense depth map from sparse depth data and RGB image respectively. However, due to the huge difference between the multi-modal signal input, vanilla convolutional neural network and simple fusion strategy cannot extract features from sparse data and aggregate multi-modal information effectively. To tackle this problem, we design a novel network architecture tha... |
GPR: Grasp Pose Refinement Network for Cluttered Scenes | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561868/ | [
"Wei Wei",
"Yongkang Luo",
"Fuyu Li",
"Guangyun Xu",
"Jun Zhong",
"Wanyi Li",
"Peng Wang",
"Wei Wei",
"Yongkang Luo",
"Fuyu Li",
"Guangyun Xu",
"Jun Zhong",
"Wanyi Li",
"Peng Wang"
] | Object grasping in cluttered scenes is a widely investigated field of robot manipulation. Most of the current works focus on estimating grasp pose from point clouds based on an efficient single-shot grasp detection network. However, due to the lack of geometry awareness of the local grasping area, it may cause severe collisions and unstable grasp configurations. In this paper, we propose a two-sta... |
Contour Primitive of Interest Extraction Network Based on One-Shot Learning for Object-Agnostic Vision Measurement | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9561168/ | [
"Fangbo Qin",
"Jie Qin",
"Siyu Huang",
"De Xu",
"Fangbo Qin",
"Jie Qin",
"Siyu Huang",
"De Xu"
] | Image contour based vision measurement is widely applied in robot manipulation and industrial automation. It is appealing to realize object-agnostic vision system, which can be conveniently reused for various types of objects. We propose the contour primitive of interest extraction network (CPieNet) based on the one-shot learning framework. First, CPieNet is featured by that its contour primitive ... |
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