Robot Motion and Control, 2002. RoMoCo '02. Proceedings of the Third International Workshop on

The paper analyzes the problem of error (failure) detection and handling in robot programming. First an overview of the subject is provided and later error detection and handling in MRROC++ are described. To facilitate system reaction to the detected failures, the errors are classified and certain suggestions are made as to how to handle those classes of errors. View full abstract»

The aim of the paper is to propose a skeleton of a decision rules system for RoboCup teams composed of autonomous virtual soccer players. Decisions concerning action selection are considered. View full abstract»

With laparoscopy, for the first time the surgeon was separated from direct contact with tissues and organs allowing the introduction of robotic and computer technologies into surgical operations, with two distinct potential advantages: 1) enhancement of precision and dexterity and 2) performance of surgical procedures from a distance, a concept known as telesurgery. View full abstract»

We present an algorithm which, taking as input positions of features (corners) in every single frame of an image sequence and the sequence itself, will generate an image of a three dimensional object optimally textured. Optimally means that for each constituent triangle of the created mesh, the texture of the best resolution will be chosen. The spatial shape of the object shown in the video sequen... View full abstract»

Proposes a control architecture for a multiple mobile robot system, and within this framework concentrates on the robot motion coordination problem. A DES-based supervisory control is developed that formally ensures collision and deadlock avoidance between a group of robots concurrently accomplishing their missions in a common 2D space. View full abstract»

Pneumatic muscles as actuators offer several advantages due to their performance weight relation or to the passive compliance of this type of actuators. Passive compliance is an important component for the control of locomotion in rough terrain to absorb the power stroke energy. This paper presents the mechatronics of a six-legged insect-like robot AirBug with pneumatic muscles as actuators. The m... View full abstract»

In this paper, the solution of a multi-robot formation task is presented. All robots use only local sensing and local communication as an additional tool for the whole system performance. We assume the solution to be local, robust to the size of the multi-robot team, stable in the case of occurrence of obstacles and able to support many formation shapes. Local inter-robot communication enables the... View full abstract»

Some new results concerned with design and dynamics analysis of the redundant POLYCRANK manipulator with eight DOFs are presented. The main links of an arm in the form of light skew hollow cranks are connected one to the other by cross-roller bearings. In the new concept of the POLYCRANK manipulator all drive units are mounted coaxially in the base. The three first DOFs with vertical axes and the ... View full abstract»

The object of our research is electromechanical controlled biped walking robot. The purpose of the work is to develop numerical parametrical optimization methods for control of walking robot by taking account of transient in the circuits of electric drive. The criterion of optimization is the minimum of electromechanical work. With classical variational control methods, for the simplest model of o... View full abstract»

We consider a motion planning problem for the mobile manipulator composed of a nonholonomic mobile platform and a holonomic manipulator fixed to the platform. The problem consists of driving the end effector to a desirable location in the task space, and avoiding simultaneously a collision of the end effector with obstacles present in the task space. Our main objective is to demonstrate that a nat... View full abstract»

Describes a vision based interface that enables the mobile robot to detect and follow a person through office environments. The proposed algorithm works by estimating the separate distributions of colors on a person's face and shirt. Using heuristics on vertical alignment of face and shirt color as well as bordering on each other, we are able to extract the person reliably and to guide the robot t... View full abstract»

This paper discusses discrete sliding mode control for two-link rigid robotic manipulators with uncertain modelling. The discrete sliding mode control problem is formulated. Necessary and sufficient conditions of stability along with the effect of sampling are stated. The discrete controller is shown to lead to a stable closed-loop system. Simulation results are presented to illustrate the feature... View full abstract»

Most of the control algorithms for robotic reaching and grasping tasks, from visual and motor perception systems, are based on feedback systems. They assume a limitation for the performance of remote reaching applications and for the robustness of the system. In this paper, a very robust learning-based model for visual-motor coordination is presented. This architecture is based on how the human sy... View full abstract»

Presents a target assignment strategy for multiple robots that are scattered in the environment and they are expected to build an ordered formation. The described approach is general and can be used together with a variety of trajectory planning methods. The presented approach produces some constraints for trajectories generation, however, in most cases the constraints can be easily satisfied. Sim... View full abstract»

In the paper a new solution to the trajectory tracking problem of a nonholonomic mobile manipulator with a (2, 0) class mobile platform has been presented. A new control algorithm for the mobile manipulator is introduced and proved. View full abstract»

We continue to investigate the possibility of slow (quasi-static) locomotion of multi-link systems along a horizontal plane owing to changing configurations. We have shown previously that the quasi-static motion of a two-link system, occurring when the angle between its links varies, is uncontrollable and that the trajectories of the system's vertices are uniquely defined by the initial position o... View full abstract»

A novel 6 DOF robotic haptic device for orthopedic training is presented for display of the motion dynamics of a virtual human knee joint. For achieving the high impedances required by this application an industrial robot has been selected as an actuator and extended with a PC-based high performance controller hardware and redundant safety features. Two possible control architectures - a force-com... View full abstract»

An approach to the design of high performance sliding mode controllers for robot manipulators is presented. It employs a Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy system to describe the sliding surface. Each rule of this system represents the maximum slope sliding line for a certain set of parameters given in the premise part. Hence, the slope of the surface is adapted according to the current state of the manipulator.... View full abstract»

This paper presents the concept of multi-level control system for minimal invasive surgery. The overall system is based on Staubli robot which plays the role of a robotic assistant for surgeons in laparoscopic cholecystectomy. The desired movement of the end effector is obtained by a movement of a joystick. In the paper, we present two simulation programs for the control of the Staubli RX60 robot ... View full abstract»

This paper presents a method which allows one to pass transversally through singularities of corank 1 for redundant manipulators. The method modifies a Jacobian matrix of the manipulator's forward kinematics to retrieve its full rank at singularities. The method is computationally inexpensive and conceptually simple. It is well suited for real time control and practical implementations. The method... View full abstract»

The new digital architecture of specialized microcontroller with neural coprocessor for efficient real time control systems of robots is presented. The main idea of the paper is to present the on-chip integrated core of the popular microcontroller, program and data memories and the neural-matrix coprocessor. In order to explain the design, the main processor, neural coprocessor and accompanied net... View full abstract»

The Unified Modelling Language (UML) is a language that helps to visualize, design and document models of large and complex systems. Terminology and notation of visual modelling can be used as common high level object oriented language for design of the mechatronic systems. View full abstract»

A 3D machine vision method used in intelligent manufacturing environments is presented. In this method, the neural network technology is used to provide effective methodologies for solving difficult computational problems in 3D recognition processes. The recognition processes can be divided into two parts. First, a 3D reconstruction. approach based on wavelet analysis is presented. The stereo matc... View full abstract»