The book written by Dr. Radu B. Rusu presents a detailed description of 3D Semantic Mapping in the context of mobile robot manipulation. As autonomous robotic platforms get more sophisticated manipulation capabilities, they also need more expressive and comprehensive environment models that include the objects present in the world, together with their position, form, and other semantic aspects, as well as interpretations of these objects with respect to the robot tasks. The book proposes novel 3D feature representations called Point Feature Histograms (PFH), as well as a frameworks for the acquisition and processing of Semantic 3D Object Maps with contributions to robust registration, fast segmentation into regions, and reliable object detection, categorization, and reconstruction. These contributions have been fully implemented and empirically evaluated on different robotic systems, and have been the original kernel to the widely successful open-source project the Point Cloud Library (PCL) -- see http://pointclouds.org.

This book is the seventh volume of the successful book series on Robot Operating System: The Complete Reference, which started in 2016. The book's objective is to provide the reader with comprehensive coverage on the Robot Operating Systems (ROS) and the latest trends and contributed systems. ROS has been considered as the primary development framework for robotics applications. There are seven chapters organized into three parts. Part I presents one chapter dealing with ROS2 and presents a tutorial on using the MediaPipe framework with ROS2. In Part II, three chapters present new contributions of ROS frameworks and applications, including micro-ROS, Autonomous 3D Thermal Mapping of Disaster Environments, and Lab-scale Smart Factory Implementation Using ROS. Part III provides contributions on how to use ROS for cooperative robotics behaviors, particularly in platoon applications, in addition to developing new perception and control algorithms with sensing technologies. This book will be a valuable companion for ROS users and developers to learn more about ROS capabilities and features.

The two-volume set LNCS 9184-9185 constitutes the constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Digital Human Modeling and Applications in Health, Safety, Ergonomics and Risk Management 2015, held as part of the 17th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, HCII 2015, held in Los Angeles, CA, USA, in August 2015. The total of 1462 papers and 246 posters presented at the HCII 2015 conferences was carefully reviewed and selected from 4843 submissions. These papers address the latest research and development efforts and highlight the human aspects of design and use of computing systems. The papers thoroughly cover the entire field of human-computer interaction, addressing major advances in knowledge and effective use of computers in a variety of application areas. The total of 96 contributions included in the DHM proceedings were carefully reviewed and selected for inclusion in this two-volume set. The 52 papers included in this volume are organized in the following topical sections: anthropometry and ergonomics; motion modeling and tracking; human modeling in transport and aviation; human modeling in medicine and surgery; quality in healthcare.

Proceedings of the 2013 Chinese Intelligent Automation Conference presents selected research papers from the CIAC’13, held in Yangzhou, China. The topics include e.g. adaptive control, fuzzy control, neural network based control, knowledge based control, hybrid intelligent control, learning control, evolutionary mechanism based control, multi-sensor integration, failure diagnosis, and reconfigurable control. Engineers and researchers from academia, industry, and government can gain an inside view of new solutions combining ideas from multiple disciplines in the field of intelligent automation. Zengqi Sun and Zhidong Deng are professors at the Department of Computer Science, Tsinghua University, China.

This book contains the papers that were presented at the 17th International Symposium of Robotics Research (ISRR). The ISRR promotes the development and dissemination of groundbreaking research and technological innovation in robotics useful to society by providing a lively, intimate, forward-looking forum for discussion and debate about the current status and future trends of robotics with great emphasis on its potential role to benefit humankind. The symposium contributions contained in this book report on a variety of new robotics research results covering a broad spectrum organized into the categories: design, control; grasping and manipulation, planning, robot vision, and robot learning.

The book covers different aspects: - Innovative technologies for tactile sensors development - Tactile data interpretation for control purposes - Alternative sensing technologies - Multi-sensor systems for grasping and manipulation - Sensing solutions for impaired people

The book focuses the latest endeavours relating researches and developments conducted in fields of Control, Robotics and Automation. Through more than twenty revised and extended articles, the present book aims to provide the most up-to-date state-of-art of the aforementioned fields allowing researcher, PhD students and engineers not only updating their knowledge but also benefiting from the source of inspiration that represents the set of selected articles of the book. The deliberate intention of editors to cover as well theoretical facets of those fields as their practical accomplishments and implementations offers the benefit of gathering in a same volume a factual and well-balanced prospect of nowadays research in those topics. A special attention toward “Intelligent Robots and Control” may characterize another benefit of this book.

The second edition of this handbook provides a state-of-the-art overview on the various aspects in the rapidly developing field of robotics. Reaching for the human frontier, robotics is vigorously engaged in the growing challenges of new emerging domains. Interacting, exploring, and working with humans, the new generation of robots will increasingly touch people and their lives. The credible prospect of practical robots among humans is the result of the scientific endeavour of a half a century of robotic developments that established robotics as a modern scientific discipline. The ongoing vibrant expansion and strong growth of the field during the last decade has fueled this second edition of the Springer Handbook of Robotics. The first edition of the handbook soon became a landmark in robotics publishing and won the American Association of Publishers PROSE Award for Excellence in Physical Sciences & Mathematics as well as the organization’s Award for Engineering & Technology. The second edition of the handbook, edited by two internationally renowned scientists with the support of an outstanding team of seven part editors and more than 200 authors, continues to be an authoritative reference for robotics researchers, newcomers to the field, and scholars from related disciplines. The contents have been restructured to achieve four main objectives: the enlargement of foundational topics for robotics, the enlightenment of design of various types of robotic systems, the extension of the treatment on robots moving in the environment, and the enrichment of advanced robotics applications. Further to an extensive update, fifteen new chapters have been introduced on emerging topics, and a new generation of authors have joined the handbook’s team. A novel addition to the second edition is a comprehensive collection of multimedia references to more than 700 videos, which bring valuable insight into the contents. The videos can be viewed directly augmented into the text with a smartphone or tablet using a unique and specially designed app. Springer Handbook of Robotics Multimedia Extension Portal: http://handbookofrobotics.org/

This volume presents a collection of papers presented at the 15th International Symposium of Robotic Research (ISRR). ISRR is the biennial meeting of the International Foundation of Robotic Research (IFRR) and its 15th edition took place in Flagstaff, Arizona on December 9 to December 12, 2011. As for the previous symposia, ISRR 2011 followed up on the successful concept of a mixture of invited contributions and open submissions. Therefore approximately half of the 37 contributions were invited contributions from outstanding researchers selected by the IFRR officers and the program committee, and the other half were chosen among the open submissions after peer review. This selection process resulted in a truly excellent technical program which featured some of the very best of robotic research. The program was organized around oral presentation in a single-track format and included for the first time a small number of interactive presentations. The symposium contributions contained in this volume report on a variety of new robotics research results covering a broad spectrum including perception, manipulation, grasping, vehicles and design, navigation, control and integration, estimation and SLAM.

Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM) has been a long-standing research problem in robotics. It describes the problem of a robot mapping an unknown environment, while simultaneously localizing in it with the help of the incomplete map. This book describes a technique called Switchable Constraints.Switchable Constraints help to increase the robustness of SLAM against data association errors and in particular against false positive loop closure detections. Such false positive loop closure detections can occur when the robot erroneously assumes it re-observed a landmark it has already mapped or when the appearance of the observed surroundings is very similar to the appearance of other places in the map. Ambiguous observations and appearances are very common in human-made environments such as office floors or suburban streets, making robustness against spurious observations a key challenge in SLAM. The book summarizes the foundations of factor graph-based SLAM techniques. It explains the problem of data association errors before introducing the novel idea of Switchable Constraints. We present a mathematical derivation and probabilistic interpretation of Switchable Constraints along with evaluations on different datasets. The book shows that Switchable Constraints are applicable beyond SLAM problems and demonstrates the efficacy of this technique to improve the quality of satellite-based localization in urban environments, where multipath and non-line-of-sight situations are common error sources.