TY  - CHAP
A1  - Stopforth, Riaan
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Steinbauer, Gerald
T1  - Europe and South African collaboration on the Mechatronics and Robotics systems as part of the SA Robotics Center
T2  - ICRA 2015 Developing Countries Forum
N2  - Mechatronics consist of the integration of mechanical
engineering, electronic integration and computer science/
engineering. These broad fields are essential for robotic
systems, yet it makes it difficult for the researchers to specialize
and be experts in all these fields. Collaboration between
researchers allow for the integration of experience and specialization,
to allow optimized systems. Collaboration between the
European countries and South Africa is critical, as each country
has different resources available, which the other countries
might not have. Applications with the need for approval of
any restrictions, can also be obtained easier in some countries
compared to others, thus preventing the delays of research.
Some problems that have been experienced are discussed, with
the Robotics Center of South Africa as a possible solution.
Y1  - 2015
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Booysen, Tracy
A1  - Mathew, Thomas
A1  - Knox, Greig
A1  - Fong, W. K.
A1  - Stüttgen, Marcel
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Steinbauer, Gerald
T1  - The Scarab Project
T2  - ICRA 2015 Developing Countries Forum
N2  - Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) is an active research
field in the robotics community. Despite recent advances
for many open research questions, these kind of systems are
not widely used in real rescue missions. One reason is that such
systems are complex and not (yet) very reliable; another is that
one has to be an robotic expert to run such a system. Moreover,
available rescue robots are very expensive and the benefits of
using them are still limited.
In this paper, we present the Scarab robot, an alternative
design for a USAR robot. The robot is light weight, humanpackable
and its primary purpose is that of extending the
rescuer’s capability to sense the disaster site. The idea is that a
responder throws the robot to a certain spot. The robot survives
the impact with the ground and relays sensor data such as
camera images or thermal images to the responder’s hand-held
control unit from which the robot can be remotely controlled.
Y1  - 2015
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Niemueller, Tim
A1  - Reuter, Sebastian
A1  - Ewert, Daniel
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Jeschke, Sabina
A1  - Lakemeyer, Gerhard
ED  - Almeida, Luis
T1  - The Carologistics Approach to Cope with the Increased Complexity and New Challenges of the RoboCup Logistics League 2015
T2  - RoboCup 2015: Robot World Cup XIX
Y1  - 2016
SN  - 978-3-319-29339-4
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29339-4_4
N1  - Lecture Notes in Computer Science ; 9513
SP  - 47
EP  - 59
PB  - Springer International Publishing
CY  - Cham
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Niemueller, Tim
A1  - Reuter, Sebastian
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Jeschke, Sabina
A1  - Lakemeyer, Gerhard
ED  - Almeida, Luis
T1  - Evaluation of the RoboCup Logistics League and Derived Criteria for Future Competitions
T2  - RoboCup 2015: Robot World Cup XIX
Y1  - 2016
SN  - 978-3-319-29339-4
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29339-4_3
N1  - Lecture Notes in Computer Science ; 9513
SP  - 31
EP  - 43
PB  - Springer International Publishing
CY  - Cham
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Niemueller, Tim
A1  - Reuter, Sebastian
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
ED  - Almeida, Luis
T1  - Fawkes for the RoboCup Logistics League
T2  - RoboCup 2015: Robot World Cup XIX
Y1  - 2016
SN  - 978-3-319-29339-4
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29339-4_31
N1  - Lecture Notes in Computer Science ; 9513
SP  - 365
EP  - 373
PB  - Springer International Publishing
CY  - Cham
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Limpert, Nicolas
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
T1  - A Local Planner for Ackermann-Driven Vehicles in ROS SBPL
T2  - Proceedings of the International Conference on Pattern Recognition Association of South Africa and Robotics and Mechatronics (PRASA-RobMech), 2015
Y1  - 2015
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1109/RoboMech.2015.7359518
SP  - 172
EP  - 177
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Leingartner, Max
A1  - Maurer, Johannes
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Steinbauer, Gerald
T1  - Evaluation of Sensors and Mapping Approaches for Disasters in Tunnels
JF  - Journal of Field Robotics
N2  - Ground or aerial robots equipped with advanced sensing technologies, such as three-dimensional laser scanners and advanced mapping algorithms, are deemed useful as a supporting technology for first responders. A great deal of excellent research in the field exists, but practical applications at real disaster sites are scarce. Many projects concentrate on equipping robots with advanced capabilities, such as autonomous exploration or object manipulation. In spite of this, realistic application areas for such robots are limited to teleoperated reconnaissance or search. In this paper, we investigate how well state-of-the-art and off-the-shelf components and algorithms are suited for reconnaissance in current disaster-relief scenarios. The basic idea is to make use of some of the most common sensors and deploy some widely used algorithms in a disaster situation, and to evaluate how well the components work for these scenarios. We acquired the sensor data from two field experiments, one from a disaster-relief operation in a motorway tunnel, and one from a mapping experiment in a partly closed down motorway tunnel. Based on these data, which we make publicly available, we evaluate state-of-the-art and off-the-shelf mapping approaches. In our analysis, we integrate opinions and replies from first responders as well as from some algorithm developers on the usefulness of the data and the limitations of the deployed approaches, respectively. We discuss the lessons we learned during the two missions. These lessons are interesting for the community working in similar areas of urban search and rescue, particularly reconnaissance and search.
Y1  - 2016
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1002/rob.21611
SN  - 1556-4967
VL  - 33
IS  - 8
SP  - 1037
EP  - 1057
PB  - Wiley-VCH
CY  - Weinheim
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Maier, Christopher
A1  - Mühlbacher, Clemens
A1  - Niemueller, Tim
A1  - Steinbauer, Gerald
A1  - Vassos, Stravros
T1  - Controlling Logistics Robots with the Action-based Language YAGI
T2  - Proceedings of the 2015 IROS Workshop on Workshop on Task Planning for Intelligent Robots in Service and Manufacturing
Y1  - 2015
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Maier, Christopher
A1  - Mühlbacher, Clemens
A1  - Niemüller, Tim
A1  - Steinbauer, Gerald
A1  - Vassos, Stravros
T1  - Controlling logistics robots with the action-based language YAGI
T2  - Intelligent Robotics and Applications: 9th International Conference, ICIRA 2016, Tokyo, Japan, August 22-24, 2016, Proceedings, Part I
Y1  - 2016
SN  - 978-3-319-43505-3 (Print)
SN  - 978-3-319-43506-0 (Online)
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-43506-0_46
N1  - Series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics)
VL  - 9834
SP  - 525
EP  - 537
PB  - Springer
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Neumann, Tobias
A1  - Dülberg, Enno
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
T1  - A rotating platform for swift acquisition of dense 3D point clouds
T2  - Intelligent Robotics and Applications: 9th International Conference, ICIRA 2016, Tokyo, Japan, August 22-24, 2016, Proceedings, Part I
Y1  - 2016
SN  - 978-3-319-43505-3 (Print)
SN  - 978-3-319-43506-0 (Online)
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-43506-0_22
N1  - Series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics)
VL  - 9834
SP  - 257
EP  - 268
PB  - Springer
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
A1  - Booysen, T.
A1  - Stopforth, R.
T1  - Why it is harder to run RoboCup in South Africa: Experiences from German South African collaborations
JF  - International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems
N2  - Robots are widely used as a vehicle to spark interest in science and technology in learners. A number of initiatives focus on this issue, for instance, the Roberta Initiative, the FIRST Lego League, the World Robot Olympiad and RoboCup Junior. Robotic competitions are valuable not only for school learners but also for university students, as the RoboCup initiative shows. Besides technical skills, the students get some project exposure and experience what it means to finish their tasks on time. But qualifying students for future high-tech areas should not only be for students from developed countries. In this article, we present our experiences with research and education in robotics within the RoboCup initiative, in Germany and South Africa; we report on our experiences with trying to get the RoboCup initiative in South Africa going. RoboCup has a huge support base of academic institutions in Germany; this is not the case in South Africa. We present our ‘north–south’ collaboration initiatives in RoboCup between Germany and South Africa and discuss some of the reasons why we think it is harder to run RoboCup in South Africa.
Y1  - 2016
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1177/1729881416662789
SN  - 1729-8806
VL  - 13
IS  - 5
SP  - 1
EP  - 13
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Mataré, Victor
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
ED  - Steinbauer, Gerald
ED  - Ferrein, Alexander
T1  - golog++ : An integrative system design
T2  - CogRob 2018. Cognitive Robotics Workshop : Proceedings of the 11th Cognitive Robotics Workshop 2018 co-located with 16th International Conference on Principles of Knowledge Representation and Reasoning (KR 2018) Tempe, AZ, USA, October 27th, 2018
Y1  - 2019
SN  - 1613-0073
SP  - 29
EP  - 35
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Limpert, Nicolas
A1  - Wiesen, Patrick
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Kallweit, Stephan
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
T1  - The ROSIN Project and its Outreach to South Africa
JF  - R&D Journal
Y1  - 2019
VL  - 35
SP  - 1
EP  - 6
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Eltester, Niklas Sebastian
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
T1  - A smart factory setup based on the RoboCup logistics league
T2  - 2020 IEEE Conference on Industrial Cyberphysical Systems (ICPS)
N2  - In this paper we present SMART-FACTORY, a setup for a research and teaching facility in industrial robotics that is based on the RoboCup Logistics League. It is driven by the need for developing and applying solutions for digital production. Digitization receives constantly increasing attention in many areas, especially in industry. The common theme is to make things smart by using intelligent computer technology. Especially in the last decade there have been many attempts to improve existing processes in factories, for example, in production logistics, also with deploying cyber-physical systems. An initiative that explores challenges and opportunities for robots in such a setting is the RoboCup Logistics League. Since its foundation in 2012 it is an international effort for research and education in an intra-warehouse logistics scenario. During seven years of competition a lot of knowledge and experience regarding autonomous robots was gained. This knowledge and experience shall provide the basis for further research in challenges of future production. The focus of our SMART-FACTORY is to create a stimulating environment for research on logistics robotics, for teaching activities in computer science and electrical engineering programmes as well as for industrial users to study and explore the feasibility of future technologies. Building on a very successful history in the RoboCup Logistics League we aim to provide stakeholders with a dedicated facility oriented at their individual needs.
Y1  - 2020
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1109/ICPS48405.2020.9274766
N1  - 2020 IEEE Conference on Industrial Cyberphysical Systems (ICPS), 10-12 June 2020, Tampere, Finland.
SP  - 297
EP  - 302
PB  - IEEE
CY  - New York, NY
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Hofmann, Till
A1  - Limpert, Nicolas
A1  - Mataré, Victor
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Lakemeyer, Gerhard
T1  - Winning the RoboCup Logistics League with Fast Navigation, Precise Manipulation, and Robust Goal Reasoning
T2  - RoboCup 2019: Robot World Cup XXIII. RoboCup
Y1  - 2019
SN  - 978-3-030-35699-6
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-35699-6_41
N1  - Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 11531
SP  - 504
EP  - 516
PB  - Springer
CY  - Cham
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Alhwarin, Faraj
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Scholl, Ingrid
T1  - An Efficient Hashing Algorithm for NN Problem in HD Spaces
T2  - Lecture Notes in Computer Science
Y1  - 2019
SN  - 978-303005498-4
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-05499-1_6
N1  - 7th International Conference on Pattern Recognition Applications and Methods, ICPRAM 2018; Funchal; Portugal; 16 January 2018 through 18 January 2018; Code 222779
SP  - 101
EP  - 115
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Alhwarin, Faraj
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Scholl, Ingrid
T1  - An Optimized Method for 3D Body Scanning Applications Based on KinectFusion
T2  - Communications in Computer and Information Science
Y1  - 2019
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-29196-9_6
SN  - 1865-0929
N1  - 11th International Joint Conference on Biomedical Engineering Systems and Technologies, BIOSTEC 2018; Funchal; Portugal; 19 January 2018 through 21 January 2018
VL  - 1024
SP  - 100
EP  - 113
PB  - Springer
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Kirsch, Maximilian
A1  - Mataré, Victor
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
T1  - Integrating golog++ and ROS for Practical and Portable High-level Control
T2  - Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Agents and Artificial Intelligence - Volume 2
N2  - The field of Cognitive Robotics aims at intelligent decision making of autonomous robots. It has matured over the last 25 or so years quite a bit. That is, a number of high-level control languages and architectures have emerged from the field. One concern in this regard is the action language GOLOG. GOLOG has been used in a rather large number of applications as a high-level control language ranging from intelligent service robots to soccer robots. For the lower level robot software, the Robot Operating System (ROS) has been around for more than a decade now and it has developed into the standard middleware for robot applications. ROS provides a large number of packages for standard tasks in robotics like localisation, navigation, and object recognition. Interestingly enough, only little work within ROS has gone into the high-level control of robots. In this paper, we describe our approach to marry the GOLOG action language with ROS. In particular, we present our architecture on inte grating golog++, which is based on the GOLOG dialect Readylog, with the Robot Operating System. With an example application on the Pepper service robot, we show how primitive actions can be easily mapped to the ROS ActionLib framework and present our control architecture in detail.
Y1  - 2020
U6  - https://doi.org/10.5220/0008984406920699
N1  - Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Agents and Artificial Intelligence: ICAART 2020, Valletta, Malta
SP  - 692
EP  - 699
PB  - SciTePress
CY  - Setúbal, Portugal
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Reke, Michael
A1  - Peter, Daniel
A1  - Schulte-Tigges, Joschua
A1  - Schiffer, Stefan
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
A1  - Walter, Thomas
A1  - Matheis, Dominik
T1  - A Self-Driving Car Architecture in ROS2
T2  - 2020 International SAUPEC/RobMech/PRASA Conference, Cape Town, South Africa
N2  - In this paper we report on an architecture for a self-driving car that is based on ROS2. Self-driving cars have to take decisions based on their sensory input in real-time, providing high reliability with a strong demand in functional safety. In principle, self-driving cars are robots. However, typical robot software, in general, and the previous version of the Robot Operating System (ROS), in particular, does not always meet these requirements. With the successor ROS2 the situation has changed and it might be considered as a solution for automated and autonomous driving. Existing robotic software based on ROS was not ready for safety critical applications like self-driving cars. We propose an architecture for using ROS2 for a self-driving car that enables safe and reliable real-time behaviour, but keeping the advantages of ROS such as a distributed architecture and standardised message types. First experiments with an automated real passenger car at lower and higher speed-levels show that our approach seems feasible for autonomous driving under the necessary real-time conditions.
Y1  - 2020
SN  - 978-1-7281-4162-6
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1109/SAUPEC/RobMech/PRASA48453.2020.9041020
N1  - 2020 International SAUPEC/RobMech/PRASA Conference, 29-31 Jan. 2020, Cape Town, South Africa
SP  - 1
EP  - 6
PB  - IEEE
CY  - New York, NY
ER  - 
TY  - CHAP
A1  - Niemueller, Tim
A1  - Zwilling, Frederik
A1  - Lakemeyer, Gerhard
A1  - Löbach, Matthias
A1  - Reuter, Sebastian
A1  - Jeschke, Sabina
A1  - Ferrein, Alexander
T1  - Cyber-Physical System Intelligence
T2  - Industrial Internet of Things
N2  - Cyber-physical systems are ever more common in manufacturing industries. Increasing their autonomy has been declared an explicit goal, for example, as part of the Industry 4.0 vision. To achieve this system intelligence, principled and software-driven methods are required to analyze sensing data, make goal-directed decisions, and eventually execute and monitor chosen tasks. In this chapter, we present a number of knowledge-based approaches to these problems and case studies with in-depth evaluation results of several different implementations for groups of autonomous mobile robots performing in-house logistics in a smart factory. We focus on knowledge-based systems because besides providing expressive languages and capable reasoning techniques, they also allow for explaining how a particular sequence of actions came about, for example, in the case of a failure.
KW  - Smart factory
KW  - Industry 4.0
KW  - Multi-robot systems
KW  - Autonomous mobile robots
KW  - RoboCup
Y1  - 2017
SN  - 978-3-319-42559-7
U6  - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-42559-7_17
N1  - Springer Series in Wireless Technology
SP  - 447
EP  - 472
PB  - Springer
CY  - Cham
ER  -