Artificial Robotics Research Articles

Efficient Implementation Techniques for Topological Predicates on Complex Spatial Objects

Topological relationships like overlap, inside, meet, and disjoint uniquely characterize the relative position between objects in space. For a long time, they have been a focus of interdisciplinary research as in artificial intelligence, cognitive science, linguistics, robotics, and spatial reasoning. Especially as predicates, they support the design of suitable query languages for spatial data retrieval and analysis in spatial database systems and geographical information systems. While, to a large extent, conceptual aspects of topological predicates (like their definition and reasoning with them) as well as strategies for avoiding unnecessary or repetitive predicate executions (like predicate migration and spatial index structures) have been emphasized, the development of robust and efficient implementation techniques for them has been largely neglected. Especially the recent design of topological predicates for all combinations of complex spatial data types has resulted in a large increase of their numbers and stressed the importance of their efficient implementation. The goal of this article is to develop correct and efficient implementation techniques of topological predicates for all combinations of complex spatial data types including two-dimensional point, line, and region objects, as they have been specified by different authors and in different commercial and public domain software packages. Our solution consists of two phases. In the exploration phase, for a given scene of two spatial objects, all topological events like intersection and meeting situations are summarized in two precisely defined topological feature vectors (one for each argument object of a topological predicate) whose specifications are characteristic and unique for each combination of spatial data types. These vectors serve as input for the evaluation phase which analyzes the topological events and determines the Boolean result of a topological predicate (predicate verification) or the kind of topological predicate (predicate determination) by a formally defined method called nine-intersection matrix characterization. Besides this general evaluation method, the article presents an optimized method for predicate verification, called matrix thinning, and an optimized method for predicate determination, called minimum cost decision tree. The methods presented in this article are applicable to all known complete collections of mutually exclusive topological predicates that are formally based on the well known nine-intersection model.

Complexity Theory

In popular dialogues, describing a system as "complex" is often the point of resignation, inferring that the system cannot be sufficiently described, predicted nor managed. Transport networks, management infrastructure and supply chain logistics are all often described in this way. Academic dialogues have begun to explore the collective behaviors of complex systems to define a complex system specifically as an adaptive one; i.e. a system that demonstrates 'self organising' principles and 'emergent' properties. Based upon the key principles of interaction and emergence in relation to adaptive and self organising systems in cultural artifacts and processes, this paper will argue that complex systems are cultural systems. By introducing generic principles of complex systems, and looking at the exploration of such principles in art, design and media research, this paper argues that a science of cultural systems as part of complex systems theory is the post modern science for the digital age. Furthermore, that such a science was predicated by post structuralism and has been manifest in art, design and media practice since the late 1960s.

The social body in motion: cognitive development in infants and androids

During the past two decades, embodiment has become an important concept in many areas of cognitive science, but so far there is no common understanding of what constitutes embodied cognition and what kind of body an artificial humanlike cognizer would require. Work in embodied artificial intelligence and robotics has addressed, to some degree, what kind of bodily implementation is necessary for embodied cognition, but crucial factors such as the role of social interaction and the ‘body-in-motion’ have still not received much attention. We argue that, in the human child, the interplay of social scaffolding and self-induced locomotion is fundamental to the development of joint attention and a ‘self’. Furthermore, we discuss the implications of the social dynamics of bodily experience for android science. We argue that keeping scientific and engineering perspectives apart, but also understanding their relation, is important for clarifying the objectives of android science. Parts of this paper have appeared in similar form in Lindblom and Ziemke (2005a, b) and Ziemke and Lindblom (2006).

Robots, insects and swarm intelligence

The aim of this paper is to consider the relationships between robots and insects. To this end, an overview is provided of the two main areas in which insects have been implicated in robotics research. First, robots have been used to provide working models of mechanisms underlying insect behaviour. Second, there are developments in robotics that have been inspired by our understanding of insect behaviour; in particular the approach of swarm robotics. In the final section of the paper, the possibility of achieving "strong swarm intelligence" is discussed. Two possible interpretations of strong swarm intelligence are raised: (1) the emergence of a group mind from a natural, or robot swarm, and (2) that behaviours could emerge from a swarm of artificial robots in the same way as they emerge from a biological swarm. Both interpretations are dismissed as being unachievable in principle. It is concluded that bio-robotic modelling and biological inspiration have made important contributions to both insect and robot research, but insects and robots remain separated by the divide between the living and the purely mechanical.

Mannigfaltige Techno-Naturen: Von epistemischen Modellsystemen und situierten Maschinen

A multitude of techno-natures emerge through discourses and practices of the new technosciences. While some philosophers and science studies scholars argue that model organisms and artefacts are getting more and more disembodied and decontextualised in the laboratory, I want to show how ontic dimensions of model organisms and artefacts are made invisible as well as visible in different practices of technosciences like Artificial Life and robotics. This analysis opens up possibilities for an understanding of how ontic dimensions of non-human actors are made visible and invisible in technoscientific practices. At the same time it allows the development of a concept of non-human actors beyond reifying, velontriquist practices of representation as well as a critical intervention in the co-construction of our technoculture.

Cognitive Maps in Rats and Robots

More is known of the navigation skills of mice and rats than of any other vertebrate. The discovery of place cells (cells whose firing rate correlates with the spatial position of the animal) in the rat’s hippoc ampus has inspired various attempts to model these cells. This work presents one such model which has been optimized on simulated autonomous agents and implemented on a mobile robot which learns to navigate within its environment through exploration using vision as its main sensory modal ity. The artificial mouse robot aMouse, a mobile robot with active whiskers and omnidirectional vision, is presented as an ideal robotic platform to study rodent navigation. The visual field of the robot is similar to the large visual field of rats and mice, and its whisker system uses real rat whiskers for tex ture recognition. The paper suggests how tactile information from the active whisker array on the robot can be used as an additional sensory modality for the place cell model described earlier.

The 2004 AAAI Spring Symposium Series

The Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, in cooperation with Stanford University's Department of Computer Science, presented the 2004 Spring Symposium Series, Monday through Wednesday, March 22-24, at Stanford University. The titles of the eight symposia were (1) Accessible Hands-on Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Education; (2) Architectures for Modeling Emotion: Cross-Disciplinary Foundations; (3) Bridging the Multiagent and Multirobotic Research Gap; (4) Exploring Attitude and Affect in Text: Theories and Applications; (5) Interaction between Humans and Autonomous Systems over Extended Operation; (6) Knowledge Representation and Ontologies for Autonomous Systems; (7) Language Learning: An Interdisciplinary Perspective; and (8) Semantic Web Services. Each symposium had limited attendance. Most symposia chairs elected to create AAAI technical reports of their symposium, which are available as paperbound reports or (for AAAI members) are downloadable on the AAAI members-only Web site. This report includes summaries of the eight symposia, written by the symposia chairs.

A new artificial life body: biologically inspired dynamic bipedal humanoid robots

Recently, a biologically inspired, bipedal, dynamic, humanoid robot was developed at the Artificial Life and Robotics Laboratory of Oita University. This bipedal humanoid robot is able to walk dynamically and to go up and down stairs. The central pattern generator developed produces various types of walking pattern. This robot has a pair of small CMOS color CCD cameras, a speaker, and a microphone in the head part, and will have a GPS, a portable telephone, and other sensors in the body part, so that the integration of locomotion and behavior to achieve specific demonstrations will be realized. This project develops dynamic mobility and the ability for autonomous recognition and navigation using the biological central nervous system, the brain system, and the real-time control system. Also, the design principles that demonstrate the dynamic interaction between neural and mechanical controls will be clarified. In Phase I, the platform of a small, bipedal, humanoid robot is used to develop autonomous locomotion and autonomous sensing and navigation. In Phase II of the project, an iteration on the platform design for human-size, bipedal, humanoid robots will be performed for operational testing. The development of bipedal humanoid robots that capture biological systems with unique principles and practices could dramatically increase their performance in tasks for national security needs.

THE COGNITIVE SCIENCES: AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH

THE COGNITIVE SCIENCES: AN INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH. Carolyn P. Sobel. Mountain View, CA: Mayfield, 2001. Pp. xx + 327. $101.00 cloth.As suggested by its subtitle, this volume looks at issues in cognitive science from varying perspectives, given in the five parts to the book: psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, artificial intelligence, and philosophy. Each part contains two chapters, the first of which reviews the development of the field as well as basic issues, and the second of which introduces some specific topics of current interest. The more specific topics include, among others: in psychology, propositional networks, mental imagery, problem solving, and memory; in neuroscience, functional and structural brain-mapping techniques; in linguistics, first and second language acquisition (covered in a total of 7–8 pages), aphasia, machine translation, and natural language processing by computer; in artificial intelligence, expert systems, connectionism, and robotics; and, in philosophy, the mind-body problem, free will, and consciousness.

CLAWAR robots progress slowly but surely

The 2003 CLAWAR conference featured 130 papers on topics related to climbing and walking robots. The paper reviews the conference, highlighting the areas of entertainment robots, de‐mining robots, manufacturing applications, the use of artificial pneumatic muscles and robots for volcanic exploration.

Image segmentation techniques and their use in artificial life robot implementation

In this article we give a brief description of the properties of human and robot vision systems. We focus on the part of vision processing that is connected with the image segmentation problem, and especially with texturebased segmentation. Such vision processing is necessary for robust indoor mobile robot navigation and for other related tasks, including line-following, and object detection and recognition. We examine the details of a texture segmentation technique based on the Gabor filtering method.

The Fourth International Symposium on Artificial Life and Robotics in Beppu, Japan

The Fourth International Symposium on Artificial Life and Robotics in Beppu, Japan

Artistic communication for A-life and robotics

In research concerning communication between machine and man and involving artificial life and robotics today, the realization of sensitive communication produced by introducing an artistic interface is receiving considerable attention. In this paper, we discuss artistic human-like communication research, including the artificial life and robotics research which would become necessary with an increasing need for man-machine communication. I have consulted an artist involved with this theme, a critic in media art, a scientist, and a biologist. Their research will be introduced from their own view points, and will cover artificial intelligence work capable of communicating with humans.

Art, consciousness and artificial life

This paper addresses the relationship of consciousness to artificial life set in the context of art. Artificial life is as much a part of our quest for self-definition as an instrument in the construction of reality. In exploring the technology of life we are exploring the possibilities of what we might become. In our hypermediated, telematic culture, the self acquires an essentially non-linear identity. Telepresence and virtual reality, the avatars of Net life, present us with a distributed, multiple identity which in turn is producing a radically new art. This embodies an ‘interstitial practice’ set within the domain of artificial life, and located at the intersections of cognitive science, bio-engineering, telematics and metaphysics. Can artists find in artificial life, nanotechnology, robotics and molecular engineering the means towards a re-materialization of art, after its postmodern, screen-based dematerialization? Just as ideas of the ‘immaterial’ have dominated art discourse for the last 15 years, so questions of emergent form, intelligent structures and artificial life are shaping a new discourse, from which art is moving off the screen and back into the material world. Will the real significance of art's re-materialization be at the level of mind? Will artificial life only gain cultural significance when it gives rise to artificial mind and the construction of consciousness?

The Third International Symposium on Artificial Life and Robotics in Beppu, Japan

The Third International Symposium on Artificial Life and Robotics in Beppu, Japan

In time and over time

Van Gelder's clear distinction between the quantitative nature of dynamical systems and the nonquantitative nature of computational processes provides a firm basis for distinguishing between processes that happen in time and processes that happen over time. Symbolic reasoning, the presumed basis of intelligent behavior in robots, happens over time. However, the movements and actions that robots must make to behave intelligently, happen in time. Attempting to connect the two, as classical artificial intelligence and robotics have presumed to be necessary, has produced a tension and an arbitrarily moving interface in the construction of robots. Adopting a robotic version of the dynamical hypothesis offers sound theoretical and scientific justification for those robotics researchers who continue to insist that getting the interaction dynamics of intelligent behavior right is a purely dynamical matter, and never a symbolic computational one.

Advances in brain research and the future of artificially assisted neural functions

In this paper, I give a brief explanation of how the brain works, and present my ideas about how experts on artificial life and robotics can contribute to brain science.

Research program of robocup

RoboCup, Robot World Cup, is an international research initiative involving over 20 countries and researchers from various fields surrounding artificial intelligence and robotics. This introductory article describes research programs involved in RoboCup. The goal of RoboCup is to establish a scheme of long-range research, and a series of short-range research goals that essentially converges into the grand challenge as well as creating numerous spin-off technologies. The range of research areas spans from robot hardware design, software and multiagent programming, to natural language systems and education. This article describes how these efforts can be coordinated as an integrative research initiative.

Artificial life and robotics

Artificial life and robotics

Artificial life and robotics—Message from the editor-in-chief

Artificial life and robotics—Message from the editor-in-chief