2014

@Article{nuechter2014a, author = {M. Al-khawaldah and A. N{\"u}chter}, title = {{Multi-Robot Cooperation for Efficient Exploration}}, journal = {AUTOMATIKA -- Journal for Control, Measurement, Electronics, Computing and Communications}, year = {2014}, volume = {55}, number = {3}, pages = {276--286} }

This paper addresses the problem of exploration of an unknown environment by developing effective equipped with continuously rotating 3D scanner. The main aim of the new strategies is to reduce the exploration time of unknown environment. Unlike most of other published works, to save time, the laser scanners rotate and scan the environment while robots are in motion. Furthermore, the new strategies are able to explore large outdoor environments as a considerable reduction of the required computations, especially those required for path planning, have been achieved. Moreover, a new exploration strategy has been developed so that robots continuously replan the order to visit the remaining unexplored areas according to the new data (i.e. updated map) collected by the robot in question or by the other team members. The new extension led to further enhancement but with slightly higher computational costs. Finally, to assess our new exploration strategies with different levels of environment complexity, new set of experiments were conducted in environments where obstacles are distributed according to the Hilbert curve. The results of these experiments show the effectiveness of the proposed technique to effectively distribute the robots over the environment. More importantly we show how the optimal number of robots is related to the environment complexity.

@CONFERENCE{aschenbrenner2014a, author = {D. Aschenbrenner, F. Leutert, F. Sittner, M. Fritscher, K. Schilling}, title = {Einsatzmöglichkeiten für Mobile Geräte bei der Wartung von Industrierobotern}, booktitle = {SPS-IPC-Drives Konferenz 2014}, year = {2014}, month = {November} }

tudien zu Industrie 4.0 zeigen, dass Produktionsmitarbeiter mobile Kommunikationstechnik zunehmend im Arbeitskontext nutzen werden und der Einsatz mobiler Endgeräte neue Möglichkeiten bei der Nutzung der aktuellen Produktionsdaten ermöglicht. Das Forschungsprojekt MainTelRob beschäftigt sich damit, die Vorteile solcher mobiler Geräte in konkreten Szenarien der Wartung und Instandhaltung von Anlagen mit Industrierobotern nutzbar zu machen.

@INPROCEEDINGS{bangert2014a, Author = {Busch, Stephan and Schilling, Klaus}, Booktitle = {2nd IAA Conference on Dynamics and Control of Space Systems (DYCOSS)}, Title = {Performance Characteristics of the UWE-3 Miniature Attitude Determinatin and Control system}, Year = {2014} }

Modern miniaturization techniques enable the realization of 3-axis attitude de- termination and control systems (ADCS), appropriate for the 1 kg pico-satellite class. One of the most challenging aspects concerns the support for continuous ADCS operations at reasonable accuracies despite extremely limited resources available on small satellite platforms. The very low power ADCS of the pico- satellite UWE-3 is based on miniature Sun sensors, magnetometers and MEMS gyroscopes for attitude determination, and uses six magnetic torquers and a sin- gle reaction wheel to control the satellite. After successful launch in November 2013, the main technical objective of the third UWE satellite is currently the in- orbit demonstration and characterization of its attitude determination and control capabilities. This contribution addresses the system design aspects and provides results obtained during its first months of operation.

@InProceedings{nuechter2014d, author = {J. Bedkowski and K. Majek and A. N{\"u}chter}, title = {Nowy algorytm 6DSLAM wykorzystujacy semantyczne rozpoznanie otoczenia}, booktitle = {13 Krajowka Konferencja Robotyki Kudowa Zdroj Prace Naukowe, Elektronika z. 194 Post. Robotyki Tom II}, pages = {513--520}, year = {2014}, moth = {June} }

W artykule przedstawiono modyfikację algorytmu 6DSLAM wykorzystującą semantyczne rozpoznawanie otoczenia. Zastosowanie semantycznego podejścia nie tylko poprawia w porównaniu do klasycznej metody dokładność tworzonej mapy metrycznej przez robota mobilnego, ale także umożliwia tworzenie takiej mapy w trudnych warunkach terenowych. Przedstawiono eksperymenty tworzenia mapy metrycznej/semantycznej budynków uwzględniając jazdę poziomą oraz kierunku pionowym po schodach. Porównano wynik z poprzednią implementacją algorytmu 6DSLAM. Nowe podejście poprawia spójność oraz dokładność mapy metrycznej. Zastosowanie semantycznego rozpoznawania otoczenia pozwala na rozszerzenie mapy metrycznej o nowe informacje o charakterze jakościowym, w tym przypadku rozróżniane są ściany, podłoga, sufit oraz punkty charakteryzujące się otoczeniem nieuporządkowanym.

@Article{borrmann2014a, author = {D. Borrmann and A. N{\"u}chter and M. \DJ{}akulovi\'{c} and I. Maurovi\'{c} and I. Petrovi\'{c} and D. Osmankovi\'{c} and J. Velagi\'{c}}, title = {A mobile robot based system for fully automated thermal 3D mapping}, journal = {Journal Advanced Engineering Informatics (JAdvEI)}, year = {2014}, volume = {28}, number = {4}, pages = {425--440}, month = {October} }

It is hard to imagine living in a building without electricity and a heating or cooling system these days. Factories and data centers are equally dependent on a continuous functioning of these systems. As beneficial as this development is for our daily life, the consequences of a failure are critical. Malfunctioning power supplies or temperature regulation systems can cause the close-down of an entire factory or data center. Heat and air conditioning losses in buildings lead to a large waste of the limited energy resources and pollute the environment unnecessarily. To detect these flaws as quickly as possible and to prevent the negative consequences constant monitoring of power lines and heat sources is necessary. To this end, we propose a fully automatic system that creates 3D thermal models of indoor environments. The proposed system consists of a mobile platform that is equipped with a 3D laser scanner, an RGB camera and a thermal camera. A novel 3D exploration algorithm ensures efficient data collection that covers the entire scene. The data from all sensors collected at different positions is joined into one common reference frame using calibration and scan matching. In the post-processing step a model is built and points of interest are automatically detected. A viewer is presented that aids experts in analyzing the heat flow and localizing and identifying heat leaks. Results are shown that demonstrate the functionality of the system.

@InProceedings{nuechter2014g, author = {G. Bruder and F. Steinicke and A. Nüchter}, title = {Immersive Point Cloud Virtual Environments}, booktitle = {Proceedings of IEEE Symposium on 3D User Interfaces 3DUI Proceedings of IEEE Symposium on 3D User Interfaces (3DUI '14) Poster}, pages = {161--162}, year = {2014}, month = {March} }

Today’s three-dimensional (3D) virtual environments (VEs) are usually based on textured polygonal 3D models, which represent the appearance and geometry of the virtual world. However, some application domains require other graphical paradigms, which are currently not adequately addressed by 3D user interfaces. We in- troduce a novel approach for a technical human-robot telepresence setup that allows a human observer to explore a VE, which is a 3D reconstruction of the real world based on point clouds. Such point cloud virtual environments (PCVEs) represent the external environ- ment, and are usually acquired by 3D scanners. We present an ap- plication scenario, in which a mobile robot captures 3D scans of a terrestrial environment, which are automatically registered to a co- herent PCVE. This virtual 3D reconstruction is displayed in an im- mersive virtual environment (IVE) in which a user can explore the PCVE. We explain and describe the technical setup, which opens up new vistas of presenting a VE as points rather than a polygonal representation.

@INPROCEEDINGS{busch2014a, Author = {Busch, Stephan and Bangert, Philip and Schilling, Klaus}, Booktitle = {4S Symposium}, Title = {Attitude Control Demonstration for Pico-Satellite Formation Flying by UWE-3}, Month = {May}, Year = {2014} }

Coming Soon

@INPROCEEDINGS{busch2014b, Author = {Busch, S. and Bangert, P. and Dombrovski, S. and Schilling, K.}, Booktitle = {Proceedings of the 65. IAC Congress, Toronto, Canada}, Number = {IAC-14.B4.6B.6}, Title = {{In-Orbit Performance and Lessons Learned of a Modular and Flexible Satellite Bus for Future Picosatellite Formations}}, Year = {2014}}

Formations of small satellites offer promising perspectives due to improved temporal and spatial coverage and resolution at reasonable costs. The UWE-program addresses in-orbit demonstrations of key technologies to enable formations of cooperating distributed spacecraft at pico-satellite level. In this context, the CubeSat UWE-3 addresses experiments for calibration and evaluation of real-time attitude determination and control. UWE-3 introduces also a modular and flexible pico-satellite bus as a robust and extensible base for future missions. Technical objective was a very low power consumption of the COTS-based system, nevertheless providing a robust performance of this miniature satellite by advanced microprocessor redundancy and fault detection, identification and recovery software. This contribution addresses the UWE-3 design and mission results with emphasis on the operational experiences of the attitude determination and control system.

@INBOOK{eck2014a, chapter = {Robotic Assistance for Senior People for Safe Mobility and Work Support}, title = {New Trends in Medical and Service Robots}, publisher = {Springer International Publishing}, year = {2014}, editor = {Aleksandar Rodic, Doina Pisla, Hannes Bleuler}, author = {Daniel Eck, Florian Leutert, Klaus Schilling}, series = {Mechanisms and Machine Science}, isbn = {978-3319054308}, pages = {1-16} }

Worldwide demographic trends of aging societies raise the demand for assistive technologies for senior people, including in particular robotic aids. Here, specifically the fields of robotic assistance for support of mobility and for workers in industrial assembly tasks are emphasized. In mobility assistance a vehicle provides navigation functionalities for route planning and for safe driving. In case of the industrial workplace, a manipulator cooperates with the worker to take the major load in lifting heavy objects, while the human provides the guidance in placing the objects. Performance tests have been performed with a user group of more than 100 seniors.

@InProceedings{elseberg2014a, author = {J. Elseberg and D. Borrmann and J. Schauer and A. N{\"u}chter and D. Koriath and U. Rautenberg}, title = {{A sensor skid for precise 3D modeling of production lines}}, booktitle = {ISPRS Annals Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, Spatial Inf. Sci., II-5. Proceedings of the Commision V Symposium Close-range imaging, ranging and applications}, year = {2014}, month = {June}, pages = {117--122}, address = {Riva del Garda, Italy} }

Motivated by the increasing need of rapid characterization of environments in 3D, we designed and built a sensor skid that automates the work of an operator of terrestrial laser scanners. The system combines terrestrial laser scanning with kinematic laser scanning and uses a novel semi-rigid SLAM method. It enables us to digitize factory environments without the need to stop production. The acquired 3D point clouds are precise and suitable to detect objects that collide with items moved along the production line.

@inproceedings{schilling2014b, author = {D. Evans and O.Koudelka and L. Alminde and K. Schilling}, title = {The ESA OPS-SAT CUBESAT mission}, booktitle = {Proceedings 4S-Symposium}, year = {2014}, city = {Mallorca} }

Coming Soon.

@InProceedings{borrmann2014b, author = {H. Houshiar and D. Borrmann and A. N{\"u}chter}, title = {{Fortlaufende semantische 3D-Kartierung von archäologischen Ausgrabungsstätten}}, booktitle = {Photogrammetrie Laserscanning Optische 3D-Messtechnik, Beitr{\"a}ge der Oldenburger 3D-Tage 2014, Jade Hochschule}, pages = {268--277}, year = {2014}, month = {February} }

Das 3D Laserscanning ist Stand der Technik bei der Modellierung archäologischer Ausgrabungsstätten, historischer Anlagen und sogar ganzer Städte oder Landschaften. Die Dokumentation der Befunde auf einer Ausgrabungsstätte ist eine wesentliche archäologische Aufgabe. Ein automatisiertes System würde diesen Prozess beschleunigen und die Anzahl der Fehler auf ein Minimum reduzieren. Dieser Beitrag stellt einen neuen Ansatz in der Dokumentation industrieller Archäologie vor. Er besteht aus einer Reihe von Tools zur Erfassung und Registrierung von 3D-Daten auf Ausgrabungsstätten. Wir stellen ein effizientes Werkzeug zur Verfügung für die Visualisierung der erworbenen 3D-Punktwolken im 3D- und 2D-Modus. Der Hauptzweck dieser Software ist Archäologen ein einfach zu bedienendes Tool für die semantische Kartierung vor Ort zu bieten. Es enthält Funktionen für die Auswahl und Kennzeichnung von Funden. Jedes Label kann mit weiteren Informationen versehen werden. Diese Daten werden im XML-Format exportiert und dienen als Eingabe für andere Systeme und Datenbanken.

@INPROCEEDINGS{kempf2014a, Author = {Busch, Stephan and Bangert, Philip and Schilling, Klaus}, Booktitle = {4S Symposium}, Title = {Reliable Networked Distributed On-Board Data Handling Using a odular Approach with Heterogeneus Components}, Month = {May}, Year = {2014} }

Robustness is a key system design criterion for on-board data handling of modern space vehicles. This contribution emphasizes for these objectives a distributed networked approach, which introduces a high degree of flexibility and reliability, in particular also for vehicle formations. The architecture is based on universal wireless inter-system links, which can directly access internal subsystems from outside and thus supports sharing of distributed resources of processing and storage capacities. For intra- and inter-vehicle communication a related concept is proposed and simulated by Omnet++. At proof of concept level for system control the RODOS embedded operating system combined with MATLAB/Simulink and the "Building Blocks Execution Platform (BBEP)" was employed. On this basis future hardware demonstrations will be prepared.

@MISC{leutert2014a, title = {Telematische Überwachung und Optimierung roboterbasierter kraftsensitiver Schleifbearbeitung}, publisher = {Mechatroniknews}, volume = {2}, author = {Florian Leutert, Markus Lotz}, pages = {3-4} }

Coming Soon

@ARTICLE{leutert2014b, author = {Leutert, F.; Ramer, C.; Pirkl, G.; Bahle, G.; Poxrucker, A.; Dresselhaus, M.; Ziegler, C.; Schilling, K.; Franke, J.; Lukowicz, P.}, title = {Robotic assistance in workshops for people with handicaps - Intuitive, safe and flexible cooperation with industrial robots}, journal = {Werkstattstechnik online}, year = {2014}, volume = {9}, pages = {567-572} }

For a successful collaboration between humans and robotic assistants in a shared workspace, users must be enabled to intuitively understand robotic data and work processes, to easily operate the robot while being protected from harm by safety systems. This article introduces an assistance system employed in sheltered workshops that achieves these goals using Augmented Reality, novel input devices, and automatic collision avoidance.

@article{nuechter2014h, author = {Qingquan Li and Long Chen and Ming Li and Shih-Lung Shaw and A. N{\"u}chter}, title = {{A Sensor-Fusion Drivable-Region and Lane-Detection System for Autonomous Vehicle Navigation in Challenging Road Scenarios}}, journal = {IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology}, year = {2014}, volume = {63}, number = {2}, pages = {540--555}, month = {February} }

Autonomous vehicle navigation is challenging since various types of road scenarios in real urban environments have to be considered, especially when only perception sensors are used, without position information. This paper presents a novel real-time optimal-drivable-region and lane detection system for autonomous driving based on the fusion of Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) and vision data. Our system uses a multisensory scheme to cover the most drivable areas in front of the vehicle. We propose a feature-level fusion method for LIDAR and vision data and an optimal selection strategy for detection of the best drivable region. Then a conditional lane detection algorithm is selectively executed depending on an automatic classification of the optimal drivable region. Our system successfully handles both structured and unstructured roads. The results of several experiments are provided to demonstrate the reliability, effectiveness, and robustness of the system.

@InProceedings{nuechter2014b, author = {Stefan May and Philipp Koch and Rainer Koch and Christian Merkl and Christian Pfitzer and Andreas N{\"u}chter}, title = {A Gereralized 2D and 3D Multi-Sensor Data Integration Approach based on Signed Distance Functions for Multi-Modal Robotic Mapping}, booktitle = {Proceedings of th 19th International Workshop on Vision, Modeling and Visualization (VMV '14)}, year = {2014}, address = {Darmstadt, Germany}, month = {October} }

This paper describes a data integration approach for arbitrary 2D/3D depth sensing units exploiting assets of the signed distance function. The underlying framework generalizes the KinectFusion approach with an object-oriented model respecting different sensor modalities. For instance, measurements of 2D/3D laser range finders and RGB-D cameras can be integrated into the same representation. Exemplary, an environment is reconstructed with a 3D laser range finder, while adding fine details from objects of interest by closer inspection with an \mbox{RGB-D} sensor. A typical application of this approach is the exploration in rescue environments, where large-scale mapping is performed on the basis of long-range laser range finders while hollows are inspected with lightweight sensors attached to a manipulator arm.

@periodical{nuechter2014e, editor = {A. N{\"u}chter and R. B. Rusu and D. Holz and D. Munoz}, title = {Journal of Robotics and Autonomous Systems (JRAS)}, issuetitle = {Special Issue on Semantic Perception, Mapping and Exploration}, volume = {62}, number = {5}, pages = {617--618}, month = {May}, year = {2014} }

@article{nuechter2014f, author = {A. N{\"u}chter and R. B. Rusu and D. Holz and D. Munoz}, title = {{Editorial: Semantic Perception, Mapping and Exploration}}, journal = {Journal of Robotics and Autonomous Systems (JRAS), Special Issue on Semantic Perception, Mapping and Exploration}, year = {2014}, volume = {62}, number = {5}, pages = {1--2}, month = {May} }

@InProceedings{nuechter2014c, author = {J. Schauer and A. N{\"u}chter}, title = {{Efficient Point Cloud Collision Detection and Analysis in a Tunnel Environment using Kinematic Laser Scanning and k-d Tree Search}}, booktitle = {Int. Arch. Photogramm. Remote Sens. Spatial Inf. Sci., XL-3, Proceedings of the Photogrammetric Computer Vision (PCV '14)}, pages = {289--295}, year = {2014}, address = {Z{\"u}rich, Switzerland}, month = {September} }

Measuring the structure gauge of tunnels and other narrow passages has so far been the only way to evaluate whether large vehicles can pass through them. But especially for very long vehicles like train wagons and their cargo, the structure gauge is an insufficient measure because the center part of the vehicle between two bogies will inevitably leave the swept volume of its cross section when moving along any other trajectory than a straight line perpendicular to its cross section. In addition, the vehicle as well as the cargo must keep a minimum safety margin from the environment at all points of its trajectory. This paper explores an automated method to check for possible collisions of a model represented by a 3D point cloud moving through the 3D point cloud of an environment. We were given environment data of a train track through a narrow tunnel where simply relying on the structure gauge would indicate that a given wagon would pass through without any collision even though in reality, the train wagon would collide with the inner tunnel wall inside a sharp turn of the tracks. The k-d tree based collision detection method presented in this paper is able to correctly highlight these collisions and indicate the penetration depth of each colliding point of the environment into the model of the train wagon. It can be generalized for any setup where two static point clouds have to be tested for intersection along a trajectory.

@inproceedings{schilling2014a, author = {K. Schilling}, title = {Networked Control of Cooperating Distributed Pico-Satellites }, booktitle = {Proceedings IFAC World Congress}, year = {2014}, city = {Cape Town}, ID = {WeC19.6} }

Coming Soon.

@inproceedings{schilling2014b, author = {K. Schilling}, title = {Perspectives for Miniaturized, Distributed, Networked Systems for Space Exploration}, booktitle = {Proceedings New Research Frontiers for Intelligent Autonomous Systems IAS-NRF}, year = {2014}, city = {Venice} }

Coming Soon.

@article{sun2014, author = {K. Sun and R. Heß and Z. Xu and K. Schilling}, title = {Real-time Robust Six Degrees of Freedom Object Pose Estimation with a Time-of-flight Camera and a Color Camera}, journal = {Journal of Field Robotics}, issn = {1556-4967}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/rob.21519}, doi = {10.1002/rob.21519}, pages = {n/a--n/a}, year = {2014} }

We present an algorithm for estimating the six degrees of freedom (6DOF) pose for a rigid object of arbitrary shape, which can move fast in cluttered environments. The RGBD data input is obtained by fusing a time-of-flight (TOF) camera and a color camera. The proposed approach is composed of a coarse estimation stage for prealignment and an accurate estimation stage for refining the coarse pose. The most important contribution is the textured iterative closest point (ICP) in the accurate stage, where the Lukas-Kanade method is incorporated into the point-to-plane ICP framework, by which geometrically symmetric objects can be handled. In addition, the pose estimation performance under motion artifacts that are common for a TOF sensor can be significantly improved. Another important contribution is the tailored sparse representation under an annealed particle filtering framework for effectively extracting the target from the background clutter and providing a coarse 6DOF pose. The entire algorithm is implemented with graphics processing unit acceleration and shows real-time performance. The approach is verified on a variety of targets in both indoor and outdoor scenarios.