On autonomous and teleoperated aerial service robots

Abstract

Traditionally, aerial robots have been used in applications that do not require physical interaction with the environment. Recently, however, there is a growing interest in using aerial robots for applications that involve active but nondestructive interaction with the environment, especially in the field of service robotics. Aerial service robots are poised to be fundamental parts of tomorrow's service applications for their low-cost, high efficiency, and safety. This thesis presents theory and application of new and advanced control architectures for autonomous and teleoperated aerial service robots. The first part of this thesis proposes different tele-control architectures that enhance the performance of the human operator while performing complex service tasks using aerial robots. The presented generic tele-control algorithms attempt to create improved telepresence of the human operator, while ensuring operator and robot safety in the presence of various classical and peculiar challenges. The second part of this thesis describes an autonomous controller for aerial manipulators. This controller exploits the dynamics of the robotic manipulator appended to the aerial robot to greatly improve the stability robustness of the controlled aerial manipulator, and to expand the flight envelop compared to the current state of the art.