Multi-modal reconfigurable robotic platform with 3D-immersive telepresence system

This paper deals with the concept of reconfigur-able and self reconfigurable robots. These robots are in-tended to be used as a main component of intelligent manufacturing systems. The paper presents basic concepts of this type of robots, kinematical methods used to build virtual models, numerical results and virtual models. Also, conclusions are at the end.

The concept of telepresence allows human beings to interact with hazardous environments and situations without facing any actual risks. Examples include the nuclear industry, outer space and underwater operations, mining, bomb disposal and firefighting. Recent progress in digital system technology, especially in technology of reconfigurable logic devices (e.g. FPGA), allows the effective implementation of advanced embedded systems characterized by high-performance data processing and high-bandwidth communication. However, most of the existing telepresence systems do not benefit from these advancements. Therefore, the goal of this work was to develop a concept and architecture of the platform for the 3D-Panoramic Telepresence System for mobile robotic applications based on reconfigurable logic devices. During the development process, two versions of the system were implemented. The first system focused on feasibility testing of major components of the proposed architecture. Based on the experimental results obtained on the first prototype of the system and their analyses, a set of recommendations were derived for an updated version of the system. These recommendations were incorporated into the implementation of the second and final version of the system.

Electric tractors (ETs) have attached significant attention in recent years due to the increasingly stringent exhaust emission policies all over the world. However, testing and evaluating all possible architectures and component sizes for ETs would be a time-consuming and expensive task. Establishing a comprehensive test bench that can implement different powertrain architectures as much as possible is thus an important and challenging task. In this study, a novel reconfigurable test platform is proposed according to the analysis results of the powertrain topologies of ETs. These results provide a verification platform to explore powertrain architecture options in future work. To be easily reconstructed under different architectures, the component installation and control system of this test platform was designed based on the modular, reconfigurable concept. To verify the feasibility of the reconfigurable test platform, two powertrain configurations were built based on this test platform framework. The rotary tillage experiments were conducted on these two configurations. The results show that the proposed reconfigurable test bench is reasonably practicable. Moreover, the control precision of the established test bench is demonstrated by comparing the torque results obtained from the experiment with the reference torque values, which indicated that this test bench also has the potential to be adapted to complex farming work scenarios.

Robotics have the potential to provide significant value to the construction, engineering design, operation, and maintenance activities. It provides a solution to capture required data from complex/ hazardous working environments by means of robotics tools and reduces the safety concerns for personnel by eliminating entry in a hazardous environment. The main objective of this paper is to provide a solution that eliminates the risks of working in confined spaces and in preventive maintenance using robotics technology in dangerous environments. Robotics solutions can minimize risk and provide a method of acquiring site data, performing inspection and maintenance in an autonomous manner. Data acquired can combine the use of robotics with AI (Artificial intelligence) to allow the machine to perform the tasks required accurately without human intervention. Many of the challenges faced at the project site may be resolved when applying this technology to the work environment. Application in plants containing hazardous gases and offshore unmanned environment will benefit from these technologies drastically. It leads to increased reliability of the project while reducing the risk of harsh operating conditions.

Multistable twist metastructures with enhanced collapsibility and multidimensional programmability

A reconfigurable robot is a robot that can change shape. Programming reconfigurable robots is complicated by the need to adapt the behavior of each of the individual module to the overall physical shape of the robot. In this position paper, we investigate a simple approach to allow the programmer to abstract over the concrete shape of a robot using the notion of a label as a simple means of addressing various parts of the structure of a robot. Labels provide the programming language designer with a means of stratifying two main components of a spatial programming language for modular robots, namely specifying the physical structure of a robot and specifying its behavior. Based on previous experience with the ATRON robot, we find that labels are a useful concept for programming modular robots.

The study in this thesis addresses the problem of opening a door with a modular and reconfigurable robot (MRR) mounted on a wheeled mobile robot platform. The foremost issue with door opening problems is the prevention of occurrence of large internal forces that arise due to position errors or imprecise modeling of the robot or its environment, i.e. the door parameters, specifically. Unlike previous methods that relied on compliance control, making the control design rather complicated, this thesis presents a new concept that utilizes the multiple working modes of the MRR modules. The control design is significantly simplified by switching selected joints of the MRR to work in passive mode during door opening operation. As a result, the occurrence of large internal forces is prevented. Different control schemes are used for control of the joint modules in different working modes. For passive joint modules, a feedforward torque control approach is used to compensate the joint friction to ensure passive motion. For the active joint modules, a distributed control method, based on torque sensing, is used to facilitate the control of joint modules working under this mode. To enable autonomous door opening, an online door parameter estimation algorithm is proposed on the basis of the least squares method; and a path planning algorithm is developed on the basis of Hermite cubic spline functions, with consideration of motion constraints of the mobile MRR. The theory is validated using simulations and experimental results, as presented herein. A distributed fault detection scheme for MRR robots with joint torque sensing is also proposed in this thesis. The proposed scheme relies on filtering the joint torque command and comparing it with a filtered torque estimate that is derived from the nonlinear dynamic model of MRR with joint torque sensing. Common joint actuator faults are considered with fault detection being performed independently for each joint module. The proposed fault detection scheme for each module does not require motion states of any other module, making it an ideal modular approach for fault detection of modular robots. Experimental results have attested the effectiveness of the proposed fault detection scheme.

The Fourth Industrial Revolution has accelerated the integration of robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) into workplaces, creating opportunities to merge technology with real-world practice. In forensic pathology, workforce shortages and the dangers of investigating hazardous death scenes highlight the need for innovation. This study explored the use of a mobile, agile quadruped robot to investigate hanging death scenes, assessing its ability to navigate, capture evidence, and reduce human risk. The research focused on low-risk hanging death scenes as a starting point, with the aim of later extending to more hazardous environments such as chemical-related scenes, fire deaths, and mass disasters. The quadruped robot demonstrated advanced mobility, allowing routine inspection tasks and the collection of visual and environmental data with accuracy, safety, and frequency. The study reviewed existing literature on robotic applications in forensic investigations, developed an initial procedure for scene evaluation, and tested the approach on selected hanging cases. The findings discuss advantages, limitations, and lessons learned, offering insight into the potential role of robotics in forensic death scene work. While promising, technical and operational challenges remain before robotics can be fully integrated into routine forensic practice.

Rapid technological developments in the past two decades have produced new inventions such as robots and incorporated them into our daily lives. Today, robots perform vital functions in homes, outer space, hospitals and on military instillations. The development of robotic surgery has given hospitals and health care providers a valuable tool that is making a profound impact on highly technical surgical procedures. The field of urology is one area of medicine that has adopted and incorporated robotic surgery into its armamentarium. Innovative robotic urologic surgical applications and techniques are being developed and reported everyday. Increased utilization and development will ultimately fuel the discovery of newer applications of robotic systems in urologic surgery. Herein we provide an overview of the history, development, and applications of robotics in surgery with a focus on urologic surgery.

With the recent advancement in the field of robotics, Robots have become versatile in size and form and can be programmed to do the most mundane as well as the most sophisticated and specialized tasks. Hence, with the advancement in this ever-demanding field comes the need to have a strong understanding of various concepts of automation and robotics. Inverse and forward kinematics are some of the key techniques in the automation and the working of robots, and a deep under-standing of the same is required for designing effective algorithms for strenuous tasks. Hence, in this manuscript, we have designed and implemented a robotic system that uses algorithms based on the concept of Inverse-Kinematics, travelling salesman/shortest path, etc, for achieving the basic task of drawing. The proposed simulated robot (Picasso) can draw basic shapes like: circles, squares, pentagons, and complex figures like: cat, flower, etc. As a part of our experimentation, we have analyzed the efficiency of our system over various images and the experimental results proved the efficiency of the system over basic shapes, but for complex figures, the proposed system fails to perform efficiently. Further, we discuss the use of the proposed system in extending fields of applications in robotics and automation.

Soft actuators provide highly adaptable actuator options for applications in wearable devices, grippers, and mobile robots due to their inherent compliance. However, this compliance causes soft actuators to have virtually infinite degrees of freedom (DoF) of motion and challenges the accurate prediction of their displacement and interaction forces. While several studies have characterized soft actuators either in blocked condition or in a specific range of motion, the testing conditions often do not match actual loading conditions, which leads to discrepancies between expected and observed mechanical behaviour. Here, we propose a novel multi-DoF experimental protocol for characterizing soft actuator interaction forces by considering three critical aspects-anchoring conditions, displacement boundary conditions, and actuation power. In order to conduct this multi-DoF characterization, we designed a novel reconfigurable robotic test platform for enforcing anchoring conditions and planar displacement boundary conditions, and measuring forces at multiple contact locations. Using this experimental protocol and setup, we dictated three loading conditions-pulling force, tip loading, and three-point bending-and analyzed the interaction forces of a soft bending actuator. Our results show that the three loading conditions produce distinct actuator behaviors. This validates the importance of loading conditions on soft actuator performance.

深空探测任务的持续推进使宇航员皮肤健康成为影响长期任务安全与效能的关键医学问题。微重力、电离辐射、月尘暴露及微生物群紊乱等深空环境应激因素可协同破坏皮肤屏障结构，诱发免疫稳态失衡及创面愈合障碍。近年来，深空皮肤防护体系逐渐形成以“多维整合防护”为核心的系统化防护模式。工程防护方面，通过优化航天服多层复合结构、富氢与含硼屏蔽材料设计以及舱体温湿调控与抗碎片防护模式，显著增强了环境防御能力；医学生物防护方面，功能性水凝胶、抗菌敷料及中药活性成分在皮肤屏障修复、免疫调控及抗氧化防御中展现出显著潜力；同时，皮肤微生态干预与可穿戴生理监测系统的发展，推动了个体化健康管理模式的形成。未来研究应聚焦航天环境-皮肤-免疫屏障的交互机制，探索智能化监测与纳米防护技术，构建以预测性预防为核心的皮肤健康保障体系，为深空任务提供系统性医学支持。

Robotics is a rapidly growing technology and robots have pervaded into most of the industries. Robotics and automation are designed to remove the human factor from the labor intensive and monotonous work and thereby decrease the associated costs. The application of robotics to agriculture is fairly recent. Robotic applications in agriculture vary from autonomous row-guidance tractors to fruit picking robots. Similarly, soil testing and soil sampling is one area in agriculture where automation of tasks and the employment of an autonomous robot would be of great use to consultants and farmers employing site specific farming techniques. Soil testing is an important part of farming used to determine the average nutrient status in a field and to obtain a measure of nutrient availability in the field. Fertilizers and other nutrients are applied to the fields based on different soil tests. Site specific farming is greatly dependent on soil testing and can result in increased yield, reduced cost and reduced water pollution. Soil testing requires a lot of soil samples and soil sampling is a time consuming, laborious process and expensive process. Most of the consultants employing site specific techniques use ATVs to get around large fields when sampling. The development of an autonomous guidance system for an ATV to perform soil sampling would be greatly beneficial to them. Labor costs would be significantly reduced and the operators would be subjected to fewer environmental elements. The use of ATVs ensures that no extra capital is needed to buy a vehicle. The use of a small vehicle like an ATV also causes less soil compaction. A WAAS enabled Differential GPS with accuracies to within 9.84 feet was used as the position sensor. Pocket PCs are more portable than a laptop computer and are more suitable for farm conditions. Shape files were used to provide the sampling points as input to the guidance program. A guidance program was made to operate on a PDA and provide guidance instructions. A microprocessor was programmed to read the guidance instructions and actuate the different components like throttle and steering. Tests were conducted to test the accuracy and consistency of the system. The offsets of each stop point from the test point were documented and analyzed. The results indicated that the system was as accurate as the GPS used for guidance. They also indicated that a guidance system can be realized with the use of very few components

An approach to the development of a hybrid high-speed rotary-wing aircraft reconfiguration system is considered. The stages of system concept development, justification of its functionality, architecture formation and technical appearance are considered.

The development of autonomous mobile machines to perform useful tasks in real work environments is currently being impeded by concerns over effectiveness, commercial viability and, above all, safety. This paper introduces a case study of a robotic excavator to explore a series of issues around system development, navigation in unstructured environments, autonomous decision making and changing the behaviour of autonomous machines to suit the prevailing demands of users. The adoption of the Real-Time Control Systems (RCS) architecture (Albus, 1991) is proposed as a universal framework for the development of intelligent systems. In addition it is explained how the use of Partially Observable Markov Decision Processes (POMDP) (Kaelbling et al., 1998) can form the basis of decision making in the face of uncertainty and how the technique can be effectively incorporated into the RCS architecture. Particular emphasis is placed on ensuring that the resulting behaviour is both task effective and adequately safe, and it is recognised that these two objectives may be in opposition and that the desired relative balance between them may change. The concept of an autonomous system having "values" is introduced through the use of utility theory. Limited simulation results of experiments are reported which demonstrate that these techniques can create intelligent systems capable of modifying their behaviour to exhibit either `safety conscious' or `task achieving' personalities.