| A large application domain for multi-robot teams involves task-oriented missions, in which potentially heterogeneous robots must solve several distinct tasks. Previous research addressing this problem in multi-robot systems has largely focused on issues of eeciency, while ignoring the real-world situated robot needs of fault tolerance and adaptivity. This paper addresses this problem by devel...

This paper presents the application of an action module planning method to an experimental climbing robot named LIBRA. The method searches for a sequence of physically realizable actions, called action modules, to produce a plan for a given task. The search is performed with a hierarchical selection process that uses task and configuration filters to reduce the action module inventory to a reas...

In this paper, the problem concerning how to coordinate concurrent behaviors, when controlling autonomous mobile robots (AMRs), is investigated. We adopt a FSM (finite state machine)-based behavior selection method to solve this problem. It is shown how a hybrid system for an AMR can be modeled as an automaton, where each node corresponds to a distinct robot state. Through transitions between s...

We describe research at the Stanford Dextrous Manipulation Lab centered around haptic exploration of objects with robot hands. The research areas include object acquisition and manipulation and object exploration with robot ngers to measure surface features, textures and friction. We assume that the robot is semi-autonomous; it can receive guidance or supervision from humans regarding object se...

Systems with multiple parallel goals (e.g. autonomous mobile robots) have a problem analogous to that of action selection in ethology. Archi-tectures such as the subsumption architecture (Brooks) involve multiple sensing-and-acting agents within a single robot, more than one of which is capable of controlling the robot on its own if allowed. Which to give control to at a given moment is normall...

One of the more difficult problems facing developers of bipedal walking robots is the selection of appropriate sensors for maintaining balance. In this experiment, the Ballybot robot is used to evaluate proposed robotic tilt sensors and sensor data processing algorithms. Two inexpensive sensors in particular are examined: a piezo-electric gyroscope designed for remote control helicopters, and a...

This work was supported by the NIH under Grant R01 HL078839. Abstract—This paper describes the development and construction of a mobile robot driven by miniature ultrasonic piezoelectric motors for minimally invasive cardiac therapy. The robot design extends upon previous prototypes of HeartLander, a miniature mobile robot that moves in an inchworm-like fashion. Construction of the system inclu...

With the growth of computational power in recent years, complex autonomous robot systems have become a possibility. To increase their flexibility and adaptability, learning mechanisms are necessary for robot control. In this paper, I present two recent legged robot-systems that use machine-learning in their foothold-selection process. It was found that currently both systems have a number of is...

Pose estimation is one of the vital issues in mobile robot navigation. Odometry data can be fused with absolute position measurements to provide better and more reliable pose estimation. This paper deals with the determination of better relative localization of a two wheeled differential drive robot by means of odometry by considering the influence of parameters namely weight, velocity, wheel p...