Related papers: A Map-free Deep Learning-based Framework for Gate-…
Autonomous drone racing (ADR) demands state estimation that is simultaneously computationally efficient and resilient to the perceptual degradation experienced during extreme velocity and maneuvers. Traditional frameworks typically rely on…
In this paper, we present a control system that allows a drone to fly autonomously through a series of gates marked with ArUco tags. A simple and low-cost DJI Tello EDU quad-rotor platform was used. Based on the API provided by the…
Low-cost mini-drones with advanced sensing and maneuverability enable a new class of intelligent sensing systems. To achieve the full potential of such drones, it is necessary to develop new enhanced formulations of both common and emerging…
Obstacle avoidance is a fundamental and challenging problem for autonomous navigation of mobile robots. In this paper, we consider the problem of obstacle avoidance in simple 3D environments where the robot has to solely rely on a single…
Quadrotors hold significant promise for several applications such as agriculture, search and rescue, and infrastructure inspection. Achieving autonomous operation requires systems to navigate safely through complex and unfamiliar…
Depth sensing is a critical function for robotic tasks such as localization, mapping and obstacle detection. There has been a significant and growing interest in depth estimation from a single RGB image, due to the relatively low cost and…
Autonomous vehicles must react in milliseconds while reasoning about road geometry and traffic intent to navigate complex situations. We introduce NovaDrive, a single-branch vision-language architecture that processes front-camera images,…
The use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) is rapidly increasing in applications ranging from surveillance and first-aid missions to industrial automation involving cooperation with other machines or humans. To maximize area coverage and…
QuadPlanes combine the range efficiency of fixed-wing aircraft with the maneuverability of multi-rotor platforms for long-range autonomous missions. In GPS-denied or cluttered urban environments, perception-based landing is vital for…
This paper presents a new framework to use images as the inputs for the controller to have autonomous flight, considering the noisy indoor environment and uncertainties. A new Proportional-Integral-Derivative-Accelerated (PIDA) control with…
Visual navigation is essential for many applications in robotics, from manipulation, through mobile robotics to automated driving. Deep reinforcement learning (DRL) provides an elegant map-free approach integrating image processing,…
Small drones are an increasing threat to both military personnel and civilian infrastructure, making early and automated detection crucial. In this work we develop a system that uses spiking neural networks and neuromorphic cameras (event…
We present a micro aerial vehicle (MAV) system, built with inexpensive off-the-shelf hardware, for autonomously following trails in unstructured, outdoor environments such as forests. The system introduces a deep neural network (DNN) called…
Autonomous aerial robots are increasingly being deployed in real-world scenarios, where transparent obstacles present significant challenges to reliable navigation and mapping. These materials pose a unique problem for traditional…
Visual Teach and Repeat (VT\&R) allows an autonomous vehicle to repeat a previously traversed route without a global positioning system. Existing implementations of VT\&R typically rely on 3D sensors such as stereo cameras for mapping and…
With the increase in use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)/drones, it is important to detect and identify causes of failure in real time for proper recovery from a potential crash-like scenario or post incident forensics analysis. The…
Most applications in autonomous navigation using mounted cameras rely on the construction and processing of geometric 3D point clouds, which is an expensive process. However, there is another simpler way to make a space navigable quickly:…
PiDrone is a quadrotor platform created to accompany an introductory robotics course. Students build an autonomous flying robot from scratch and learn to program it through assignments and projects. Existing educational robots do not have…
Autonomous aerial navigation in absolute darkness is crucial for post-disaster search and rescue operations, which often occur from disaster-zone power outages. Yet, due to resource constraints, tiny aerial robots, perfectly suited for…
Image-goal navigation (ImageNav) tasks a robot with autonomously exploring an unknown environment and reaching a location that visually matches a given target image. While prior works primarily study ImageNav for ground robots, enabling…