The use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in civilian and domestic applications is highly demanding, requiring a high-level of capability from the vehicles. This work addresses the design and implementation of a visi...
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The use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in civilian and domestic applications is highly demanding, requiring a high-level of capability from the vehicles. This work addresses the design and implementation of a vision-based feature tracker for an autonomous helicopter. Using vision in the control loop allows estimating the position and velocity of a set of features with respect to the helicopter. The helicopter is then autonomously guided to track these features (in this case windows in an urban environment) in real time. The results obtained from flight trials in a real world scenario demonstrate that the algorithm for tracking features in an urban environment, used for visual servoing of an autonomous helicopter is reliable and robust
Intermodal trains are typically the fastest trains operated by North American freight railroads. It is thus ironic that these trains tend to have the poorest aerodynamic characteristics. Because of constraints imposed...
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Intermodal trains are typically the fastest trains operated by North American freight railroads. It is thus ironic that these trains tend to have the poorest aerodynamic characteristics. Because of constraints imposed by equipment design and diversity, there are often large gaps between intermodal loads and these trains incur greater aerodynamic penalties and increased fuel consumption compared to other trains. We conducted train energy analyses of the most common intermodal train configurations operated in North America. It was found that matching intermodal loads with cars of appropriate length reduces the gap length thereby improving airflow. Properly matching cars with loads also avoids use of cars that are longer and thus heavier than necessary. For double stack containers on well cars, train resistance may be reduced by as much as 9% and fuel savings by 0.52 gallon per mile per train. Proper loading of intermodal trains is therefore important to improving energy efficiency. We have developed a wayside machine vision system that automatically scans passing trains and assesses the aerodynamic efficiency of the loading pattern. Machine vision algorithms are used to analyze these images and detect and measure gaps between loads and develop a quantitative index of the loading efficiency of the train. Integration of this metric that we call "slot efficiency" can provide intermodal terminal managers feedback on loading performance for trains and be integrated into the software support systems used for loading assignment
A goal of robotics has been to develop mechanisms that have the efficiency and speed of wheeled robots with the terrain flexibility of legged robots. In previous work, we have proposed a unique three-legged mechanism,...
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A goal of robotics has been to develop mechanisms that have the efficiency and speed of wheeled robots with the terrain flexibility of legged robots. In previous work, we have proposed a unique three-legged mechanism, the rotopod, designed to integrate these two useful approaches to locomotion. In this paper, we present an analysis of the variety of gaits that can be exhibited by the rotopod. We present examples of many of these gaits and discuss their potential use. A trajectory generation algorithm is presented that can be used to generate point to point trajectories using one of three different styles of gait.
Driver assistance systems that monitor driver intent, warn drivers of lane departures, or assist in vehicle guidance are all being actively research and even put into commercial production. It is therefore important t...
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In this paper we presented a novel, agile robot mechanism, which we call a rotopod, which combines aspects of wheeled and legged locomotion. A general description of how a tripedal rotopod can be made to step, rotatin...
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An attractive approach to improve tracking performance for visual surveillance is to use information from multiple visual sensory cues such as position, color, shape, etc. Previous work in fusion for tracking has tend...
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Automated video tracking is useful in a number of applications such as surveillance, multisensor networks, robotics and virtual reality. In this paper we investigate an approach to tracking based on fusing the output ...
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In this paper we proposed to solve the eye detection and localization problem under a general statistical model based object detection framework. A binary tree representation is used to discover the objects' under...
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This paper presents an overview of investigations into the role of computervision technology in developing safer automobiles. We consider vision systems which can not only look out of the vehicle to detect and track ...
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In this work, we have taken the first step towards the creation of a computerized seeing-eye guide-dog. The system we presented extends the development of assistive technology for the visually impaired into a new area...
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