13 accepted papers
Software frameworks like the Stack of Tasks (SoT), the Stanford Whole-Body Control (WBC) library, or the instantaneous Task Specification using Constraints (iTaSC) have enabled robots to perform advanced, contact-oriented manipulation tasks. jgeom constr and eTaSL are among the few formal, computer-…
Real-world applications of vision-based robot learning face two major challenges: extreme partial observability and effective simulation-to-reality (sim-to-real) transfer. This letter introduces a robust robot learning framework that enhances uncertainty awareness to address these challenges. We rei
Software frameworks like the <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Stack of Tasks</i> (SoT), the Stanford <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Whole-Body Control</i> (WBC) library
This paper presents a framework for multi-agent navigation in structured but dynamic environments, integrating three key components: a shared semantic map encoding metric and semantic environmental knowledge, a claim policy for coordinating access to areas within the environment, and a Model Predict
This paper studies sand profile grading, a manipulation task to obtain a desired geometric curve in sand. Manipulating sand is challenging because like other amorphous materials, its properties are difficult to estimate and emergent effects such as collapses may occur which both influence the manipu
The Unified Robot Description Format (URDF) and, to a lesser extent, the COLLAborative Design Activity (COLLADA) format are two of the most popular domain-specific languages (DSLs) to represent kinematic chains in robotics with support in many tools including Gazebo, MoveIt!, KDL or IKFast. In this…
Robots that have to robustly execute their task in an environment containing many variations need situational awareness to adapt at run-time. This work proposes a knowledge-centered software architecture with a world model (WM) as a first class citizen, from which other software components can query
This work explains the use of invariants in robotic perception and control skills. An “invariant” is a mathematical constraint that remains unchanged under a particular transformation in a system. This property makes robotic functionalities more robust against “disturbances” that cause these transfo
We investigate two major limiting factors in the design and implementation of modern dynamics solvers that interfere with their full utilization in versatile, manipulation-driven robotic software architectures. The first limitation originates from the design of those solvers which aims at computatio…
In this work a graph-based, semantic mapping approach for indoor robotics applications is presented, which is extending OpenStreetMap (OSM) with robotic-specific, semantic, topological, and geometrical information. Models are introduced for basic indoor structures such as walls, doors, corridors, el…
The problem of robotic task definition and execution was pioneered by Mason, who defined setpoint constraints where the position, velocity, and/or forces are expressed in one particular task frame for a 6-DOF robot. Later extensions generalized this approach to constraints in 1) multiple frames; 2)
This paper presents a distributed world model that is able to adapt to changes in the Quality of Service (QoS) of the communication layer by online reconfiguration of perception algorithms. The approach consists of (a) a mechanism for storage, exchange and processing of world model data and (b) a fe…
Symbolic reasoners generate plans which are often not exploiting the robot capabilities and are sensitive to runtime disturbances. This work proposes a scheduler as an interface between a discrete, symbolic plan and a motion control based on constraint optimization. Acting as a local reasoner, the s…