Fast, autonomous flight in GPS-denied and cluttered environments

Autonomy holds a great promise by improving the applications, safety, and efficiency of flight. If little operator input is necessary, unmanned rotorcraft have a wide range of applications ranging from cargo delivery to inspection. Currently unmanned rotorcraft are underutilized because they either have to fly on preplanned missions at high altitude or require careful teleoperation. A capable autonomous rotorcraft will have to react quickly to previously unknown obstacles, land at unprepared sites, and fly with semantic information to enable long-term autonomy in cluttered environments.In this talk we give an overview of how autonomy systems are currently designed and how pushing the performance and safety of these systems challenges current verification paradigms. In particular we will address how a supervisory layer in the motion planning system can improve safety, a sensor steering system enables us to optimize coverage for safe trajectories, and how semantic information can help us guide the rotorcraft.

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Immunity-Based Framework for Autonomous Flight in GNSS-Denied Environment

International Review of Aerospace Engineering (IREASE) ◽

10.15866/irease.v12i6.16215 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 12 (6) ◽

pp. 239

Author(s):

Mohanad Alnuaimi ◽

Mario George Perhinschi ◽

Ghassan Al-Sinbol

Keyword(s):

Autonomous Flight

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Faculty Opinions recommendation of Navigating with grid and place cells in cluttered environments.

Faculty Opinions – Post-Publication Peer Review of the Biomedical Literature ◽

10.3410/f.736415117.793566317 ◽

2019 ◽

Author(s):

Atsushi Iriki ◽

Rafael Bretas Vieira

Keyword(s):

Place Cells ◽

Cluttered Environments

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Power Allocation for Coexisting Multicarrier Radar and Communication Systems in Cluttered Environments

IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing ◽

10.1109/tsp.2021.3060003 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-1

Author(s):

Fangzhou Wang ◽

Hongbin Li

Keyword(s):

Power Allocation ◽

Communication Systems ◽

Cluttered Environments

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Agoraphilic navigation algorithm in dynamic environment with obstacles motion tracking and prediction

Robotica ◽

10.1017/s0263574721000588 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-19

Author(s):

H. S. Hewawasam ◽

M. Yousef Ibrahim ◽

Gayan Kahandawa ◽

T. A. Choudhury

Keyword(s):

Free Space ◽

Motion Tracking ◽

Dynamic Environment ◽

Experimental Tests ◽

Cluttered Environments ◽

Navigation Algorithm ◽

Prediction Module ◽

Future Space ◽

Free Spaces ◽

Advanced Development

Abstract This paper presents a new algorithm to navigate robots in dynamically cluttered environments. The proposed algorithm uses basic concepts of space attraction (hence the term Agoraphilic) to navigate robots through dynamic obstacles. The new algorithm in this paper is an advanced development of the original Agoraphilic navigation algorithm that was only able to navigate robots in static environments. The Agoraphilic algorithm does not look for obstacles (problems) to avoid but rather for a free space (solutions) to follow. Therefore, it is also described as an optimistic navigation algorithm. This algorithm uses only one attractive force created by the available free space. The free-space concept allows the Agoraphilic algorithm to overcome inherited challenges of general navigation algorithms. However, the original Agoraphilic algorithm has the limitation in navigating robots only in static, not in dynamic environments. The presented algorithm was developed to address this limitation of the original Agoraphilic algorithm. The new algorithm uses a developed object tracking module to identify the time-varying free spaces by tracking moving obstacles. The capacity of the algorithm was further strengthened by the new prediction module. Future space prediction allowed the algorithm to make decisions considering future growing/diminishing free spaces. This paper also includes a bench-marking study of the new algorithm compared with a recently published APF-based algorithm under a similar operating environment. Furthermore, the algorithm was validated based on experimental tests and simulation tests.

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Real time fall detection using infrared cameras and reflective tapes under day/night luminance

Journal of Ambient Intelligence and Smart Environments ◽

10.3233/ais-210605 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 1-16

Author(s):

E. Ramanujam ◽

S. Padmavathi

Keyword(s):

Low Cost ◽

Age Groups ◽

Orientation Angle ◽

Fall Detection ◽

Living Environment ◽

Vision Systems ◽

Ir Camera ◽

Cluttered Environments ◽

Infrared Cameras ◽

Time Fall

Falls are the leading cause of injuries and death in elderly individuals who live alone at home. The core service of assistive living technology is to monitor elders’ activities through wearable devices, ambient sensors, and vision systems. Vision systems are among the best solutions, as their implementation and maintenance costs are the lowest. However, current vision systems are limited in their ability to handle cluttered environments, occlusion, illumination changes throughout the day, and monitoring without illumination. To overcome these issues, this paper proposes a 24/7 monitoring system for elders that uses retroreflective tape fabricated as part of conventional clothing, monitored through low-cost infrared (IR) cameras fixed in the living environment. IR camera records video even when there are changes in illumination or zero luminance. For classification among clutter and occlusion, the tape is considered as a blob instead of a human silhouette; the orientation angle, fitted through ellipse modeling, of the blob in each frame allows classification that detects falls without pretrained data. System performance was tested using subjects in various age groups and “fall” or “non-fall” were detected with 99.01% accuracy.

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