Category: Robotics

Robots inspect ship hulls

The objective of the European project BugWright2 is to develop and demonstrate an adaptable autonomous robotic solution for servicing ship outer hulls. By combining the capabilities of autonomous micro air vehicles and small autonomous underwater vehicles, with teams of magnetic-wheeled crawlers operating directly on the surface of the structure, the inspection and cleaning system will be able to seamlessly merge the acquisition of a global overview of the structure with…

Intelligent boarding to ski lifts

A novel boarding solution for cabin-based transport systems — e.g., ski lifts, cable cars, subways — is being discussed in industry and has already been implemented in the Austrian skiing resort Bad Gastein: In order to avoid long queues at succeeding boarding stations, a display in the boarding area tells the guests how many of them are allowed to enter the next cabin. This form of access control guarantees spare…

Communication demands of drone applications

Small drones become increasingly popular for civil applications, including production of movies and delivery of important goods. The wireless communications and networking of drones is an essential building block in such systems. Lakeside Labs researchers have been working in this domain for several years; now they wrote a comprehensive survey article on the characteristics and requirements of drone networks. Evsen Yanmaz, senior researcher and project manager, states: “Our survey quantifies…

Austrian robotics workshop

About 80 researchers from industry and academia met at the Austrian Robotics Workshop in Klagenfurt on May 7 and 8, 2015, giving talks and demonstrations on recent developments in robotics and autonomous systems. Among them, various Lakeside Labs scientists presented their research in unmanned aerial vehicle systems, namely on wireless communications, collision avoidance, path planning, and video streaming. Two highlights were keynote talks given by invited experts: Sabine Hauert from…

Collaborative mapping with mobile robot teams

New packages for the Robot Operating System (ROS) are available for autonomous exploration of unknown environments using collaborating mobile robots equipped with cameras. The software offers wireless ad hoc communications between robots, merging of maps from different robots, and coordinated selection of exploration frontiers. A prototype with up to four robots was built that demonstrates its functionality in an indoor environment. There is a broad spectrum of applications for mobile…

Job selection in UAV-based delivery services

Aerial delivery services using small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have been proposed by major online retailers, logistics companies, and startups. An interdisciplinary project team at the University of Klagenfurt aims at contributing to the architectural setup and distributed control of such future systems. Small UAVs have found their way to civil applications. A broad variety of UAV models has been developed and commercialized in the past few years and is…

Research days on multi-UAV systems

The Sixth Research Days of Lakeside Labs und U Klagenfurt from July 8 — 12, 2013, hosted invited experts, professors, and young researchers to discuss ideas and exchange experiences on systems with multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Autonomous UAVs are used with increasing interest in civil and commercial applications and by the scientific research community. Recently, research and development efforts have shifted toward using teams of UAVs for monitoring, surveillance,…