Size matters for many
robotic applications. Large size may be required for great reach or
mass, for example, while small size may be required to access confined
spaces or for stealth. As Site Director of the NSF Safety,
Security, and Rescue Research Center (SSR-RC), I am particularly
interested in small robots for access to confined spaces for urban
search and rescue. This is important as small size results in severe
constraints on resources and drives the need for miniaturization. This
talk will address of variety of projects of the SSR-RC aimed at
resource-constrained robots.
The bulk of this talk focuses on work supporting the CRAWLER - a
Cylindrical Robot for Autonomous Walking and Lifting during Emergency
Response (a.k.a. TerminatorBot). The talk begins with a brief
description of CRAWLER, itself. A soda can-size robot with dual-use
limbs for locomotion and manipulation, CRAWLER's two,
three-degree-of-freedom limbs can manipulate small objects with a pinch
grasp, or drag the body of the robot along rough terrain. In its
locomotion modes, the weight of the body is supported by its
environment much like a cold-blooded reptile. The talk continues with a
description of a novel metric for classifying terrain based on "gait
bounce". Gait bounce is the vertical motion of objects in the visual
scene resulting from the cyclic motions of the limb gaits. Gait bounce
can be measured naturally by visual servoing errors with no additional
sensors. From the gait bounce signature, the immediate terrain can be
classified for self-adaptation or other needs. Self-adaptation is
important for this robot due to its complexity. The human/computer
interface can overwhelm typical users in the field. Therefore, we are
developing a novel "wearable joystick" for commanding the robot in
gloves-on hazardous environments. Based on these needs for motion
control and computer vision, the talk concludes with preliminary work
on a single-chip, embedded, multiprocessor system for real-time control
and self-adaptation of the hardware/software system.
Biography
Dr.
Richard Voyles received his Ph.D. in Robotics from Carnegie Mellon
University in 1997, Master degree in Mechanical Engineering from
Stanford University in 1989, and B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering
from Purdue University in 1983. Currently, he is the associate
professor in the department of computer science and engineering at the
University of Minnesota, and site Director of the NSF Safety, Security,
and Rescue Research Center at University of Minnesota.