HuBeRo - a Framework to Simulate Human Behaviour in Robot Research

Social robots' software is commonly tested in a simulation due to the safety and convenience reasons as well as an environment configuration repeatability assurance. An interaction between a robot and a human requires taking a person presence and his movement abilities into consideration. The purpose of the article is to present the HuBeRo framework, which can be used to simulate human motion behaviour. The framework allows independent control of each individual's activity, which distinguishes the presented approach from state-of-the-art, open-source solutions from the robotics domain. The article presents the framework assumptions, architecture and an example application with respect to presented scenarios.

A New Approach to the Histogram-Based Segmentation of Synthetic Aperture Radar Images

Radar machine vision is an emerging research field in the mobile robotics. Because Synthetic ApertureRadars (SAR) are robust against weather and light condition, they provide more useful and reliable in formation than optical images. On the other hand, the data processing is more complicated and less researched than visible light images processing. The main goal of our reasarch is to build simple and efficient method of SAR image analysis. In this article we describe our research related to SAR image segmenta tion and attempts to detect elements such as the build ings, roads and forest areas. Tests were carried out for the images made available by Leonardo Airborne & Space System Company.

MATLAB Implementation of Direct and Indirect Shooting Methods to Solve an Optimal Control Problem With State Constraints

The paper presents a general procedure to solve numerically optimal control problems with state constraints. Itis used in the case, when the simple time discretization of the state equations and expressing the optimal control problem as a nonlinear mathematical programming problem is too coarse. It is based on using in turn two multiple shooting BVP approaches: direct and indirect.The paper is supplementary to the earlier author’s paper on direct and indirect shooting methods, presenting the theory underlying both approaches. The same example is considered here and brought to an end, that is two full listings of two Matlab codes are shown.

A Novel Merchant Optimization Algorithm for Solving Optimal Reactive Power Problem

In this paper Merchant Optimization Algorithm (MOA) is proposed to solve the optimal reactive power problem. Projected algorithm is modeled based on the behavior of merchants who gain in the market through various mode and operations. Grouping of the traders will be done based on their specific properties, and by number of candidate solution will be computed to individual merchant. First Group named as “Ruler candidate solution” afterwards its variable values are dispersed to the one more candidate solution and it named as “Serf candidate solution” In standard IEEE 14, 30, 57 bus test systems Merchant Optimization Algorithm (MOA) have been evaluated. Results show the proposed algorithm reduced power loss effectively.

Humanoid Robot Path Planning Using Rapidly Explored Random Tree and Motion Primitives

Path planning is an essential part of the control system of any mobile robot. In this article the path planner for a humanoid robot is presented. The short description of an universal control framework and the Motion Generation System is also presented. Described path planner utilizes a limited number of motions called the Motion Primitives. They are generated by Motion Generation System. Four different algorithms, namely the: Informed RRT, Informed RRT with random bias, and RRT with A* likeheuristics were tested. For the last one the version with biased random function was also considered. All mentioned algorithms were evaluated considering three dif ferent scenarios. Obtained results are described and discussed.

A new method for computation of positive realizations of linear discrete-time systems

A new method for computation of positive realizations of given transfer matrices of linear discrete-time linear systems is proposed. Sufficient conditions for the existence of positive realizations of transfer matrices are given. A procedure for computation of the positive realizations is proposed and illustrated by an example.

Continuous-Curvature Trajectory Planning

Continuous‐curvature paths play an important role in the area of driving robots: as vehicles usually cannot changethe steering angle in zero‐time, real trajectories must not have discontinuities in the curvature profile. Typical continuous‐curvature paths are thus built of straight lines, arcs and clothoids. Due to the geometric nature of clothoids, some questions in the area of trajectory planning are difficult the answer – usually we need approximations here. In this paper we describe a full approach for continuous‐curvature trajectory planning for mobile robots – it covers a maneuver‐based planning with Viterbi optimization and geometric approximations required to construct the respective clothoid trajectories.