Related papers: Perception-Informed Autonomous Environment Augment…
Many current robot designs prioritize efficiency and one-size-fits-all solutions, oftentimes overlooking personalization, adaptability, and sustainability. To explore alternatives, we conducted two co-design workshops with 23 participants,…
Deep reinforcement learning has proven to be a great success in allowing agents to learn complex tasks. However, its application to actual robots can be prohibitively expensive. Furthermore, the unpredictability of human behavior in…
Autonomous navigation in unknown environments is a fundamental challenge in robotics, particularly in coordinating ground and aerial robots to maximize exploration efficiency. This paper presents a novel approach that utilizes a…
In this paper, we propose a concept learning architecture that enables a robot to build symbols through self-exploration by interacting with a varying number of objects. Our aim is to allow a robot to learn concepts without constraints,…
Advancing Machine Learning (ML)-based perception models for autonomous systems necessitates addressing weak spots within the models, particularly in challenging Operational Design Domains (ODDs). These are environmental operating conditions…
This paper introduces a system designed to generate explanations for the actions performed by an autonomous robot in Human-Robot Interaction (HRI). Explainability in robotics, encapsulated within the concept of an eXplainable Autonomous…
Many tasks in control, robotics, and planning can be specified using desired goal configurations for various entities in the environment. Learning goal-conditioned policies is a natural paradigm to solve such tasks. However, current…
As robotic systems become increasingly complex, the need for explainable decision-making becomes critical. Existing explainability approaches in robotics typically either focus on individual modules, which can be difficult to query from the…
Domestic and service robots have the potential to transform industries such as health care and small-scale manufacturing, as well as the homes in which we live. However, due to the overwhelming variety of tasks these robots will be expected…
We discuss the process of building semantic maps, how to interactively label entities in them, and how to use them to enable context-aware navigation behaviors in human environments. We utilize planar surfaces, such as walls and tables, and…
We propose a planning and perception mechanism for a robot (agent), that can only observe the underlying environment partially, in order to solve an image classification problem. A three-layer architecture is suggested that consists of a…
Autonomous robotic exploration of unknown and hazardous environments, a long-standing challenge, can be significantly improved by leveraging the advanced reasoning of Vision-Language Models (VLMs). We introduce a novel exploration pipeline…
Homogeneity and heterogeneity represent a well-known trade-off in the design of modular robot systems. This work addresses the heterogeneity concept, its rationales, design choices and performance evaluation. We introduce challenges for…
Service robots are increasingly entering the home to provide domestic tasks for residents. However, when working in an open, dynamic, and unstructured home environment, service robots still face challenges such as low intelligence for task…
Traditional aerial vehicles have limitations in their capabilities due to actuator constraints, such as motor saturation. The hardware components and their arrangement are designed to satisfy specific requirements and are difficult to…
A core aspect of human intelligence is the ability to learn new tasks quickly and switch between them flexibly. Here, we describe a modular continual reinforcement learning paradigm inspired by these abilities. We first introduce a visual…
In robotics, one of the main challenges is that the on-board Artificial Intelligence (AI) must deal with different or unexpected environments. Such AI agents may be incompetent there, while the underlying model itself may not be aware of…
Achieving greater autonomy in automation systems is crucial for handling unforeseen situations effectively. However, this remains challenging due to technological limitations and the complexity of real-world environments. This paper…
Evolutionary algorithms offer great promise for the automatic design of robot bodies, tailoring them to specific environments or tasks. Most research is done on simplified models or virtual robots in physics simulators, which do not capture…
The rapid development of robotics has benefited by more and more people putting their attention to it. With the demand for robots is growing for the purpose of fulfilling tasks instead of humans, how to control the robot better is becoming…