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Experiments on Pause and Go State Estimation and Control with Uncertain Sensors Feedback

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Bio-Inspired Information and Communications Technologies (BICT 2021)

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Abstract

A bio-inspired state estimation and control algorithm is experimentally tested to autonomously balance a team of robots on a circle. In this control scheme inspired from the social behavior of some insects species, a leader is elected randomly and periodically moves at a constant angular speed. The followers triggered by the leader motion, implement a decentralized and non-cooperative state estimation and control algorithm using uncertain and noisy proximity sensor measurements. Individuals in the team are immobile during the pause sequence to gather and process proximity distances, identify closer neighbors, and estimate their relative phase distances. During the go sequence, they either accelerate to achieve the desired spacing from closer neighbors, or move at a constant angular speed in phase with the leader. The scheme is tested on caster wheeled robots equipped with a rotating sonar platform to get forward and backward distances and is shown capable to balance the team of robots even in the presence of false readings or intermittent measurements. Further, at steady-state, the team of robots is capable to self balance in the absence of sensor feedback.

Supported by the United States Naval Academy and by the program “STAR 2018” of the University of Naples Federico II and Compagnia di San Paolo, Istituto Banco di Napoli - Fondazione, project ACROSS.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    \(\mathrm {rem}(z)\) denotes the unique solution for r to the equation \(z=2\pi w +r\), where \(-\pi \le r<\pi \), \(w\in \mathbb {Z}\).

  2. 2.

    We say that robot i is ahead of j at time k if \(\xi _{ij}(k)>0\), otherwise i is behind j.

  3. 3.

    For simplicity, given the pause-and-go implementation, the measured distance and related quantities will be only defined at time instants kp, with k being an integer.

  4. 4.

    The notation |kp indicates that agent i has used all information collected until kp.

  5. 5.

    Note that \(\varphi _{\max }=4.2\times 10^{-2}\) rad since \(\delta _{\max }=0.02\) m. The relationship between \(\varphi _{\max }\) and \(\delta _{\max }\) is given below Eq. (5).

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Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to Samuel Coyle and Kevin Lee for contributing during the Summer Program for Undergraduate Research (CU SPUR 2018) in preliminary works to design and fabricate the robotic platform.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. United States Naval Academy, Annapolis, MD, USA

    Violet Mwaffo

  2. University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, CO, USA

    Jackson S. Curry

  3. University of Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy

    Francesco Lo Iudice & Pietro DeLellis

Authors
  1. Violet Mwaffo
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  2. Jackson S. Curry
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  3. Francesco Lo Iudice
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  4. Pietro DeLellis
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Contributions

V.M., P.D., and F.L.I. designed the study, J.S.C. conducted the experiments on ground robots, V.M., P.D., F.L.I., and J.S.C. performed the analysis, V.M., and P.D. wrote the manuscript, with contributions from all authors.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Violet Mwaffo .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Osaka City University, Sugimoto, Japan

    Tadashi Nakano

6 Appendix

6 Appendix

Table 2. Proximity distances in radiant (rad) measured frontward and backward by the ultrasonic sensor in an exemplary trial. Note that in case of no measurement or no object detected within the sensing range, the estimated proximity distance is set to “n.a.” as in (3). False readings are inside a box.
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figure c

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Mwaffo, V., Curry, J.S., Lo Iudice, F., DeLellis, P. (2021). Experiments on Pause and Go State Estimation and Control with Uncertain Sensors Feedback. In: Nakano, T. (eds) Bio-Inspired Information and Communications Technologies. BICT 2021. Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, vol 403. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-92163-7_8

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