Robotic Vacuum Research Articles

Digital Twin-Driven Analysis of Design Constraints

Design constraints play a critical role in product development. Management of constraints significantly affect achievements of functions. Conventionally, constraints analysis is driven by designers’ knowledge, cognition and experience. Besides, constraints analysis is an iterative work with high cost, time and efforts. As an emerging technology, digital twin enhances the information processing with its synchronization, high-quality model and real-time data exchange. Therefore, digital twin is expected to enhance the conventional constraints analysis. This report is written to envision the digital-twin driven analysis of design constraints. The envision will focus on constraints identification, boundaries detection and importance analytics. A case study of robot vacuum cleaner is used as an illustrative example. It is concluded that DT improves the overall reliability of constraints analysis while reducing human efforts into iterative work.

Providentia: Using search-based heuristics to optimize satisficement and competing concerns between functional and non-functional objectives in self-adaptive systems

In general, a system may be subject to a combination of functional requirements (FRs) that dictate behavior and non-functional requirements (NFRs) that characterize how FRs are to be satisfied. NFRs also introduce cross-cutting concerns that may be difficult to predict, where the degree of satisfaction (i.e., satisficement) of one NFR may be impacted by the satisficement of one or more FRs/NFRs. In particular, self-adaptive systems (SASs) can modify system configurations or behaviors at run time to continuously satisfy FRs and NFRs. This paper presents Providentia, a search-based technique to optimize the satisficement of NFRs in an SAS experiencing various sources of uncertainty. Providentia explores different combinations of weighted FRs to maximize NFR/FR satisficement. Experimental results suggest that Providentia-optimized goal models significantly improve the satisficement of an SAS when compared with manually- and randomly-generated weights and subgoals. Additionally, we apply a hyper-heuristic (Providentia-SAW) to balance the contribution of NFRs, FRs, and the number of adaptations and further improve the Providentia technique. We apply Providentia and Providentia-SAW to two case studies in different application domains involving a remote data mirroring network and a robotic vacuum controller, respectively.

Finding Patterns in Signals Using Lossy Text Compression

Whether the source is autonomous car, robotic vacuum cleaner, or a quadcopter, signals from sensors tend to have some hidden patterns that repeat themselves. For example, typical GPS traces from a smartphone contain periodic trajectories such as “home, work, home, work, ⋯”. Our goal in this study was to automatically reverse engineer such signals, identify their periodicity, and then use it to compress and de-noise these signals. To do so, we present a novel method of using algorithms from the field of pattern matching and text compression to represent the “language” in such signals. Common text compression algorithms are less tailored to handle such strings. Moreover, they are lossless, and cannot be used to recover noisy signals. To this end, we define the recursive run-length encoding (RRLE) method, which is a generalization of the well known run-length encoding (RLE) method. Then, we suggest lossy and lossless algorithms to compress and de-noise such signals. Unlike previous results, running time and optimality guarantees are proved for each algorithm. Experimental results on synthetic and real data sets are provided. We demonstrate our system by showing how it can be used to turn commercial micro air-vehicles into autonomous robots. This is by reverse engineering their unpublished communication protocols and using a laptop or on-board micro-computer to control them. Our open source code may be useful for both the community of millions of toy robots users, as well as for researchers that may extend it for further protocols.

Improvement in Recurrent Dysphonia Associated with the Regular Use of a Robot Vacuum: A Case Study

ABSTRACT This case study describes the experience of a woman in her late 40s with chronic recurrent episodes of dysphonia. The patient reported that the purchase and use of a robot vacuum resulted in a significant decrease in the levels of dust in her home, particularly in locations she found difficult to clean thoroughly with a conventional vacuum (e.g., under the bed). She observed a concomitant decrease in a previously established pattern of work-related dysphonia, reporting fewer days of atypical voice quality and no episodes of aphonia across a one-year period. For patients whose dysphonia is exacerbated by environmental allergens, use of a robot vacuum is an automated, relatively inexpensive strategy to consider as a possible adjunct to more conventional approaches.

Modular architecture of the intellectual system for solving the problems of the internet of things

Purpose of the study.The aim of the study is the formation of the modular architecture of an intelligent system for solving the problems of the Internet of things. For this, modern trends in the development of technologies are considered, among which the most significant, promising areas and events in the field of information technologies are highlighted. Among these areas, events highlighted: the introduction of Industry 4.0 technologies; use of cloud, fog computing; machine learning; cognitive approach in the field of artificial intelligence; development of cognitive computing. The main content of these areas is disclosed. In the context of the Internet of things, the modular architecture of an intelligent system is considered and its modules for solving tasks of purposeful behavior are described. As part of the development of the Internet of things, approaches to the management of innovative processes are considered. Emphasis is placed on the use of cognitive maps. With an increase in the volume of information, problems arise in making effective decisions. For this, intelligent systems focused on the use of conceptual representations and scripting concepts are considered.Materials and research methods.When solving problems within the framework of the Industry 4.0 concept (the Internet of things), new approaches and methods are required. System Industry 4.0 represents many technologies, including the creation of devices, sensors, and many protocols for their interaction. One of its main directions is the Internet of things, which represents a new step in improving the Internet. For the development of the Internet of things, fog computing is used that extends and complements cloud computing. One of the central places on the Internet of things is machine learning. A brief description of the basic methods of machine learning is given. The use of a cognitive approach in the context of understanding and using mechanisms that allow a person to decipher information about reality and organize it for comparisons, decision making and many new tasks that arise in everyday life is shown. The developing directions of cognitive computing are presented.Results.The modular architecture of an intelligent system for solving the problems of the Internet of things is proposed: modules of an intelligent system for solving the problems of the Internet of things using sensory images; intelligent system modules for solving the problems of the Internet of things using conceptual representations; intelligent system modules for solving the problems of the Internet of things using concept scenarios. Significant, promising areas and events in the field of information technology are presented and their main content is disclosed. Approaches to the management of innovative processes are considered. The use of a fuzzy cognitive map is described, which reflects the stages and factors of creating a robot vacuum cleaner that affect the life cycle.Conclusion.Using the modular architecture of an intelligent system allows you to solve the problem of targeted behavior using sensual images of the world. Such systems can be used to solve the problems of the Internet of things. Using an integrated approach to the description of reality, the intelligent system of modular architecture allows the formation of conceptual representations and conceptual scenarios. They can reduce the flow of information, which is important for the Internet of things and the Internet of everything. Description of significant, promising areas in the field of information technology, approaches to managing innovative processes gives an understanding of the development of cognitive computing.

HOUSTON, WE HAVE A (PHYSICAL ACTIVITY) PROBLEM

Apply It!Summary Statement:Pulled Text: • Physical activity is associated with several health and well-being benefits, but current levels of daily physical activity are at an all-time low. • Daily physical activity has decreased over the years due to declining lifestyle physical activity levels. • Innovative strategies from health and fitness professionals are needed to promote physical activity throughout the day. Physical activity is associated with several health and well-being benefits but has decreased over the years due to declining rates of lifestyle physical activity. “Despite these well-known benefits of physical activity though, there has still been a gradual decline in overall daily physical activity levels.” “Various devices/appliances have been invented that reduce the physical activity associated with performing household chores. For example, sweeping requires moderate-intensity physical activity but can now be replaced with an autonomous robotic vacuum cleaner (e.g., the ‘Roomba’).” Performing these tasks without modern technology, Amish adults accumulate an average of 48 hours per week of moderate- to vigorous-intensity physical activity (14).

Autonomous multi-function floor cleaning robot with zig zag algorithm

<span>In this present era, people live a very busy life. People in cities have irregular and long working times. In such a situation a person will always find ways of saving time. Household chores are the ones that are most dreaded upon and cleaning a home tops the list. An autonomous floor cleaning robot is developed to help people to complete their cleaning task. This paper presents the development of an autonomous floor cleaning robot by using Arduino as a platform for processing and controlling the input and output. Autonomous vacuum cleaner robot is designed to make cleaning process become easier compared to using manual vacuum. The idea is basically by having the sensor to detect any object and send the input to Arduino that will control the robot movement. This robot can perform vacuum and wiping task with water spray function. It is also programmed to move in zigzag movement to ensure that the robot can clean all the corner of the house and avoid obstacle autonomously. This robot consists of three ultrasonic sensors, one infra-red (IR) sensor and two brushes in front of it to ensure effective cleaning. It is designed to run on flat surface. This autonomous multi-function floor cleaning robot has lower cost compared to existing vacuum robot on the shelves and is suitable for home and small premise usage.</span>

Analogical stimuli retrieval approach based on R-SBF ontology model

ABSTRACTAnalogy-based design is an effective approach for innovative design involving knowledge representation, analogical sources retrieval, mapping between two systems, and adaptation of candidate solutions. The knowledge representation is the first task to determine whether analogy can be implemented successfully. It is, therefore, necessary to have an efficient description method for knowledge representation and information retrieval. Based on the Structure-Behaviour-Function (SBF) model, this paper proposes an R-SBF model to integrate the flow, structure, behaviour and function of design knowledge. Relational types of states are used to describe the information behaviour with relations of ‘and’, ‘or’, ‘not’, ‘sequence’, ‘parallel’ and ‘feedback’. The R-SBF ontology model is constructed using the ontology editing tool Protégé 5.2.0 to link the knowledge representation and analogues retrieval. In the proposed algorithm of computing function similarity, both the semantic similarity and conceptual correlation are considered for the query scalability. The evaluation criteria for feasibility include Recall, Precision, and F-measure. An analogy-aided design innovation software prototype is developed to support the design activity. The improvement of a robot vacuum cleaner is discussed as an example of applications of the proposed method. The solution illustrates the effectiveness of the analogical stimuli to facilitate the design performance.

QUAREL: A Dataset and Models for Answering Questions about Qualitative Relationships

Many natural la guage questions require recognizing and reasoning with qualitative relationships (e.g., in science, economics, and medicine), but are challenging to answer with corpus-based methods. Qualitative modeling provides tools that support such reasoning, but the semantic parsing task of mapping questions into those models has formidable challenges. We present QUAREL, a dataset of diverse story questions involving qualitative relationships that characterize these challenges, and techniques that begin to address them. The dataset has 2771 questions relating 19 different types of quantities. For example, “Jenny observes that the robot vacuum cleaner moves slower on the living room carpet than on the bedroom carpet. Which carpet has more friction?” We contribute (1) a simple and flexible conceptual framework for representing these kinds of questions; (2) the QUAREL dataset, including logical forms, exemplifying the parsing challenges; and (3) two novel models for this task, built as extensions of type-constrained semantic parsing. The first of these models (called QUASP+) significantly outperforms off-the-shelf tools on QUAREL. The second (QUASP+ZERO) demonstrates zero-shot capability, i.e., the ability to handle new qualitative relationships without requiring additional training data, something not possible with previous models. This work thus makes inroads into answering complex, qualitative questions that require reasoning, and scaling to new relationships at low cost. The dataset and models are available at http://data.allenai.org/quarel.

Design and Fabrication of Robotic Vacuum Cleaner with Blower Unit

Design and Fabrication of Robotic Vacuum Cleaner with Blower Unit

Biologically Inspired Design of Context-Aware Smart Products

Abstract The rapid development of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and cyber–physical systems (CPSs) has paved the way for the increasing popularity of smart products. Context-awareness is an important facet of product smartness. Unlike artifacts, various bio-systems are naturally characterized by their extraordinary context-awareness. Biologically inspired design (BID) is one of the most commonly employed design strategies. However, few studies have examined the BID of context-aware smart products to date. This paper presents a structured design framework to support the BID of context-aware smart products. The meaning of context-awareness is defined from the perspective of product design. The framework is developed based on the theoretical foundations of the situated function–behavior–structure ontology. A structured design process is prescribed to leverage various biological inspirations in order to support different conceptual design activities, such as problem formulation, structure reformulation, behavior reformulation, and function reformulation. Some existing design methods and emerging design tools are incorporated into the framework. A case study is presented to showcase how this framework can be followed to redesign a robot vacuum cleaner and make it more context-aware.

Simultaneous localization and mapping and the situativeness of a new generation of geomedia technologies

Simultaneous localization and mapping technology is commonly used within mobile devices and household appliances—it allows our vacuum robot to navigate the living room and enables us to view augmented reality content on our smartphones. By examining simultaneous localization and mapping–based devices and contrasting them against more traditional forms of cartographic practices, we argue that simultaneous localization and mapping technology not only opens up interior spaces for geographic examination but also calls into question the categorical difference between inside and outside itself. As with simultaneous localization and mapping, the mathematical construction of the surrounding space happens in the moment of its detection, simultaneous localization and mapping exhibits a moment of radical situativeness that is freed from the constraints of a stabilized, external database. We propose that this moment of situativeness, which is also inscribed into the resulting highly mobile and fluid visualizations, is the defining feature of a new kind of geomedia that simultaneously establish a vertical and a horizontal geography.

Fundamental study of evaluation and target-setting methods for robot vacuum cleaners

Fundamental study of evaluation and target-setting methods for robot vacuum cleaners

The Robotic Imaginary: The Human and the Price of Dehumanized Labor by Jennifer Rhee

655 BOOKS IN REVIEW This concern aside, Reddell’s book is a highly informative and thoughtprovoking read. It is a wonderful contribution to sf cinema, cinematic sound analysis, and, more generally, an understanding of the sf cinematic experience in various periods and countries. Reddell deftly articulates the profound intellectual and experimental dynamics that make up what is often considered to be a secondary element of the cinematic experience. Further, he greatly expands the examination of how, in concert with broader technological forces, the explorative and innovative nature of sound technologies circumscribes conceptions of possible futures and of potential interactions with the indeterminacy of the alien and of outer space.—Dylan Cree, Concordia University Distance and Intimacy. Jennifer Rhee. The Robotic Imaginary: The Human and the Price of Dehumanized Labor. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 2018. 240pp. $108 hc, $27 pbk. The mechanisms we humans use officially and circumstantially to judge another’s humanness emerge from the realms of care work, domestic work, and emotional labor. Such work tends to operate under two interwoven rules: distance and intimacy. Both must be present to counterweigh the work of the healthcare assistant, the childcare provider, or the mental health counselor. Too little contact and we accuse our caregivers of bitter medicine; too much and we might feel the need to reciprocate the care we have received. Another way to frame the central problematic here might be to suggest that whoever gets to be the one in need is the one we describe as human. Now imagine that the caregiver is a robot giving off an electric hum and emoting according to cybernetic protocols. Jennifer Rhee’s The Robotic Imaginary explores the human as a conceptual category in search of the mechanisms of humanness and dehumanization. The book introduces many robots across its four chapters. Readers will meet ELIZA. Designed by Jospeh Weizenbaum in 1966, this screen-interface AI was used to emulate a therapist. It would first ask leading questions and later reference past user inputs to perform conversational acuity (33-37). Readers will meet Shakey, a robot designed by a team led by Nils Nilsson at the Stanford Research Institute between 1966 and 1972. Shakey uses a programmed map of a more-orless empty apartment along with basic sensory input to navigate. Shakey malfunctioned often and was a very early prototype for the robotic vacuum (7075 ). Readers will also meet Kismet, a robotic head programmed to learn from conversational inputs. Kismet’s speech patterns, inquisitiveness, and appearance are all designed so that conversation partners will underestimate the robot and treat it as a child, mentee, or dependant (101-105). The pattern of introducing uniquely likable robots designed for care, domestic, and emotional labor stops when the book returns in the fourth chapter to the subject with which it opens: drones. Rhee begins her study by comparing the dehumanizing experience of Yemenis living under the threat of drone strikes with a related yet distinct manner of dehumanization exhibited by drone operators in the United States. Rhee’s epigraphs include a statement by Yemeni Ezzaldeen Tuaiman, “They’re going to kill me next,” beside another made by drone operator Michael Haas, “Ever step 656 SCIENCE FICTION STUDIES, VOLUME 46 (2019) on ants and never give it another thought?” (1). Here two forms of dehumanization have taken effect, mediated by drone ballistics, flight tech, hardware, and software. Such dynamics are taken up in great detail in “Dying,” the book’s fourth chapter. But first Rhee offers a thoroughgoing elaboration of the cultural history of robotics and artificial intelligence, interspersed with excursions into robot aesthetics and cybernetic art. Rhee offers much more than a cultural history of robotics. The book focuses on history, but it does so in order to attend to the robotic imaginary, which Rhee defines as “the shifting inscriptions of humanness and dehumanizing erasures evoked by robots” (5). Robots call to mind certain figurations of both the human and the inhuman. For Rhee, the work of the robotic imaginary is simultaneously about forming humanizing connections between otherwise differentiated entities and dehumanizing divisions between otherwise similar entities. The robotic imaginary operates in the realm of metaphor and anti-metaphor, and such connections and disconnections...

Constraint management for concept ideation in conceptual design

Constraint plays a critical role in swaying the direction of concept ideation in conceptual design. Design constraints should be differentiated from design objectives because they play different roles in influencing ideation. Constraint management is a very challenging task in conceptual design because they are mostly abstract, subjective, and dynamic. This paper focuses on constraint management for the sake of concept ideation. In this work, design constraints are modeled as the initial and boundary conditions of concept ideation. A new classification scheme is proposed to classify various design constraints into four categories: input internal constraint, system internal constraint, input external constraint, and system external constraint. A new concept ideation process is prescribed to generate more constraint-compliant concepts, through biologically inspired design. Some existing design methods, such as Domain Structure Matrix and Concept Map, are incorporated into the proposed process. A case study is presented to showcase how to follow the proposed method to redesign a robotic vacuum cleaner to make it more compliant with stricter design constraints.

Robotic vacuum cleaners save energy? Raising cleanliness conventions and energy demand in Australian households with smart home technologies

The ‘digital revolution’ of household life is underway, with technologies such as robotic vacuum cleaners (robovacs) increasingly common. Various other automated appliances are emerging and being adopted in pursuit of the ‘smart home’. Current discourses include assumptions and explicit claims that smart homes will be energy efficient and therefore more environmentally sustainable. However, smart home technologies are also presented as affording lifestyle enhancements in the areas of comfort, cleanliness, convenience, entertainment and security. Focusing specifically on one smart device – the robovac – this paper aims to demonstrate how visions of cleanliness in the smart home could be counterproductive to energy reductions and household wellbeing. We draw on a content analysis of smart home marketing and articles, and conversational interviews (involving home tours) with early adopters of robovacs and smart home technologies in Australia. We find that these devices may escalate conventions of cleanliness in the home and invite supplementary energy consumption. The paper concludes by providing suggestions for how energy stakeholders can respond.

A decision-making methodology for the cloud-based recycling service of smart products: a robot vacuum cleaner case study

ABSTRACTThe smart product represents a new type of products, which contains software and hardware components. Many obsolete smart products are required to be recycled each year. In the developing countries, the inappropriate treatment of obsolete smart products contaminates the natural environment. This study aims to coordinate the abilities of social recycling organisations and improve the recovery rate of waste smart products. A framework of the recycling service for smart products is proposed based on the concept of cloud manufacturing. In the framework, a smart product ontology is designed to integrate the lifecycle data generated by the smart product. To decide the recycling choice of the components of smart products with the lifecycle data, a fuzzy-rule-based decision method is proposed. In cloud-based recycling service, the abilities of different recycling factories are virtualised as a pool of recycling resources. The virtualisation is achieved by the recycling resource ontology. In order to select optimal recycling resources and encapsulate the recycling service, a grey-relational-analysis-based method is proposed. A robot vacuum cleaner, which is a smart product, is adopted to demonstrate the proposed decision methods. The results show that the methods are effective for deciding the cloud-based recycling service for smart products.

Sampling and inactivation of wet disseminated spores from flooring materials, using commercially available robotic vacuum cleaners.

Four commercially available robotic vacuum cleaners were assessed for sampling efficiency of wet disseminated Bacillus atrophaeus spores on carpet, polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and laminate flooring. Furthermore, their operability was evaluated and decontamination efficiency of one robot was assessed, using a sodium hypochlorite solution. In an environmental chamber, robots self-navigated around 4m2 of flooring containing a single contaminated 0·25m2 tile (c.104 spores per cm2 ). Contamination levels at predetermined locations were assessed by macrofoam swabs (PVC and laminate) or water soluble tape (carpet), before and after sampling. Robots were dismantled postsampling and spore recoveries assessed. Aerosol contamination was also measured during sampling. Robot sampling efficiencies were variable, however, robots recovered most spores from laminate (up to 17·1%), then PVC and lastly the carpet. All robots spread contamination from the 'hotspot' (all robots spread <0·6% of the contamination to other areas) and became surface contaminated. Spores were detected at low levels during air sampling (<5·6 spores per litre). Liquid decontamination inactivated 99·1% of spores from PVC. Robotic vacuum cleaners show promise for both sampling and initial decontamination of indoor flooring. In the event of a bioterror incident, e.g. deliberate release of Bacillus anthracis spores, areas require sampling to determine the magnitude and extent of contamination, and to establish decontamination efficacy. In this study, we investigate robotic sampling methods against high concentrations of bacterial spores applied by wet deposition to different floorings, contamination spread to other areas, potential transfer of spores to the operators and assessment of a wet vacuum robot for spore inactivation. The robots' usability was evaluated and how they can be employed in real life scenarios. This will help to reduce the economic cost of sampling and the risk to sampling/decontamination teams.

The robot crawler graph process

Information gathering by crawlers on the web is of practical interest. We consider a simplified model for crawling complex networks such as the web graph, which is a variation of the robot vacuum edge-cleaning process of Messinger and Nowakowski. In our model, a crawler visits nodes via a deterministic walk determined by their weightings which change during the process deterministically. The minimum, maximum, and average time for the robot crawler to visit all the nodes of a graph is considered on various graph classes such as trees, multi-partite graphs, binomial random graphs, and graphs generated by the preferential attachment model.

Only Isotetrahedra Can Be Stampers

“RULO” is a popular robot vacuum cleaner in Japan with a Reuleaux triangle-like shape. It is popular because of the convenience it brings to a household. One only needs to turn it on before leaving...