Related papers: Hybrid Autonomy Framework for a Future Mars Scienc…
Multi-phase trajectories of aerospace vehicle systems involve multiple flight segments whose transitions may be triggered by boolean logic in continuous state variables, control and time. When the boolean logic is represented using only…
Autonomous robots have real-world applications in diverse fields, such as mobile manipulation and environmental exploration, and many such tasks benefit from a hands-off approach in terms of human user involvement over a long task horizon.…
Aerial field robotics research represents the domain of study that aims to equip unmanned aerial vehicles - and as it pertains to this chapter, specifically Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs)- with the ability to operate in real-life environments…
Fast and reliable wireless communication has become a critical demand in human life. In the case of mission-critical (MC) scenarios, for instance, when natural disasters strike, providing ubiquitous connectivity becomes challenging by using…
The surface and subsurface of worlds beyond Mars remain largely unexplored. Yet these worlds hold keys to fundamental questions in planetary science - from potentially habitable subsurface oceans on icy moons to ancient records preserved in…
The number of daily small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (sUAS) operations in uncontrolled low altitude airspace is expected to reach into the millions. UAS Traffic Management (UTM) is an emerging concept aiming at the safe and efficient…
Open-Vocabulary Mobile Manipulation (OVMM) is a crucial capability for autonomous robots, especially when faced with the challenges posed by unknown and dynamic environments. This task requires robots to explore and build a semantic…
This paper proposes an alignment for the operationalisation of Meaningful Human Control (MHC) for autonomous systems by proposing operational principles for MHC and introducing a generic framework for its application. With a plethora of…
Four Wheeled Mecanum Robot (FWMR) possess the capability to move in any direction on a plane making it a cornerstone system in modern industrial operations. Despite the extreme maneuverability offered by FWMR, the practical implementation…
Autonomous terrain classification is an important problem in planetary navigation, whether the goal is to identify scientific sites of interest or to traverse treacherous areas safely. Past Martian rovers have relied on human operators to…
Mapping and navigation have gone hand-in-hand since long before robots existed. Maps are a key form of communication, allowing someone who has never been somewhere to nonetheless navigate that area successfully. In the context of…
In applications such as search and rescue or disaster relief, heterogeneous multi-robot systems (MRS) can provide significant advantages for complex objectives that require a suite of capabilities. However, within these application spaces,…
The ability to traverse an unknown environment is crucial for autonomous robot operations. However, due to the limited sensing capabilities and system constraints, approaching this problem with a single robot agent can be slow, costly, and…
Autonomous docking between Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and ground robots is essential for heterogeneous systems, yet most existing approaches target wheeled platforms whose limited mobility constrains exploration in complex terrains.…
Advances in planetary robotics have led to wheeled robots that have beamed back invaluable science data from the surface of the Moon and Mars. However, these large wheeled robots are unable to access rugged environments such as cliffs,…
Object navigation in multi-floor environments presents a formidable challenge in robotics, requiring sophisticated spatial reasoning and adaptive exploration strategies. Traditional approaches have primarily focused on single-floor…
Robotic space missions have long depended on automation, defined in the 2015 NASA Technology Roadmaps as "the automatically-controlled operation of an apparatus, process, or system using a pre-planned set of instructions (e.g., a command…
The Curiosity rover is one of the most complex systems successfully deployed in a planetary exploration mission to date. It was sent by NASA to explore the surface of Mars and to identify potential signs of life. Even though it has limited…
While autonomous multi-robots can achieve safe and coordinated navigation, they often struggle to adapt to unforeseen conditions and to capture operator-driven objectives in unstructured environments. We present a Virtual Reality (VR)-based…
Autonomous robots used in infrastructure inspection, space exploration and other critical missions operate in highly dynamic environments. As such, they must continually verify their ability to complete the tasks associated with these…