Robotics IAS0060

This course aims to introduce various essential themes of mobile robotics, such as feedback control for motion, robotic vision, sensor fusion, bioinspired locomotion, path planning and simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM). The course teaches practical knowledge that introduces students to contemporary methods of robot programming. Either using the Robot Operating System (ROS) or direct programming on microcontrollers to define robot software architecture and solve various problems from the above-mentioned fields.

The course is based on project work where several students collaborate in a group. Each group can choose from three topics which are either focused on motion control for bioinspired underwater vehicles, sensor fusion or SLAM. The groups work independently with supervision by researchers from the Centre for Biorobotics towards solving a global goal within the respective projects. This goal is broken down into sub-tasks on a weekly basis. Furthermore, the students must showcase their progress towards the final goal with weekly oral progress reports and programming assignments. The necessary algorithms are initially developed and tested within simulation environments. Upon successful testing those algorithms are implemented, tested and evaluated on real robots in the Centre for Biorobotics.

Goals and Learning outcomes:

Learn to solve practical problems in mobile robotics
Learn how robot software is designed and implemented
Learn to use simulators to speed up designing robot applications
Learn to write software for real robots and test them
Learn to solve the most fundamental robotics problems (sensing and actuation coupling, control, mapping, trajectory planning etc.)

Course Prerequisites:

Programming skills (preferably C++ or Python)
Math and physics courses on the level of university engineering curricula
High level of motivation and willingness to work hard

Short description of the 3 topics: