Ramón González

Offers an integrated presentation for path planning and motion control of cooperative mobile robots using discrete-event system principles Generating feasible paths or routes between a given starting position and a goal or target position—while avoiding obstacles—is a common issue for all mobile robots. This book formulates the problem of path planning of cooperative mobile robots by using the paradigm of discrete-event systems. It presents everything readers need to know about discrete event system models—mainly Finite State Automata (FSA) and Petri Nets (PN)—and methods for centralized path planning and control of teams of identical mobile robots. Path Planning of Cooperative Mobile Robots Using Discrete Event Models begins with a brief definition of the Path Planning and Motion Control problems and their state of the art. It then presents different types of discrete models such as FSA and PNs. The RMTool MATLAB toolbox is described thereafter, for readers who will need it to provide numerical experiments in the last section. The book also discusses cell decomposition approaches and shows how the divided environment can be translated into an FSA by assigning to each cell a discrete state, while the adjacent relation together with the robot's dynamics implies the discrete transitions. Highlighting the benefits of Boolean Logic, Linear Temporal Logic, cell decomposition, Finite State Automata modeling, and Petri Nets, this book also: Synthesizes automatic strategies based on Discrete Event Systems (DES) for path planning and motion control and offers software implementations for the involved algorithmsProvides a tutorial for motion planning introductory courses or related simulation-based projects using a MATLAB package called RMTool (Robot Motion Toolbox)Includes simulations for problems solved by methodologies presented in the book Path Planning of Cooperative Mobile Robots Using Discrete Event Models is an ideal book for undergraduate and graduate students and college and university professors in the areas of robotics, artificial intelligence, systems modeling, and autonomous control.

This monograph is framed within the context of off-road mobile robotics. In particular, it discusses issues related to modelling, localization, and motion control of tracked mobile robots working in planar slippery conditions. Tracked locomotion constitutes a well-known solution for mobile platforms operating over diverse challenging terrains, for that reason, tracked robotics constitutes an important research field with many applications (e.g. agriculture, mining, search and rescue operations, military activities). The specific topics of this monograph are: historical perspective of tracked vehicles and tracked robots; trajectory-tracking model taking into account slip effect; visual-odometry-based localization strategies; and advanced slip-compensation motion controllers ensuring efficient real-time execution. Physical experiments with a real tracked robot are presented showing the better performance of the suggested novel approaches to known techniques. Keywords: longitudinal slip, visual odometry, slip-compensation control, robust predictive control, trajectory tracking. Related subjects: Robotics – Mechanical Engineering – Mechanics – Computer Science – Artificial Intelligence - Applications

This monograph is framed within the context of off-road mobile robotics. In particular, it discusses issues related to modelling, localization, and motion control of tracked mobile robots working in planar slippery conditions. Tracked locomotion constitutes a well-known solution for mobile platforms operating over diverse challenging terrains, for that reason, tracked robotics constitutes an important research field with many applications (e.g. agriculture, mining, search and rescue operations, military activities). The specific topics of this monograph are: historical perspective of tracked vehicles and tracked robots; trajectory-tracking model taking into account slip effect; visual-odometry-based localization strategies; and advanced slip-compensation motion controllers ensuring efficient real-time execution. Physical experiments with a real tracked robot are presented showing the better performance of the suggested novel approaches to known techniques. Keywords: longitudinal slip, visual odometry, slip-compensation control, robust predictive control, trajectory tracking. Related subjects: Robotics – Mechanical Engineering – Mechanics – Computer Science – Artificial Intelligence - Applications

Eine neue Studie zur Konsumentenstruktur und zum Einkaufsverhalten im Raum Basel Die Etablierung von Einkaufszentren in beinahe allen Industrie- und Schwellenlandern hat in den Stadten zu einem allgemeinen Strukturwandel gefuhrt. Vorbild waren die Vereinigten Staaten, in denen die ersten Zentren in den 1950er Jahren eroffnet wurden. In Basel sind innerhalb der letzten zehn Jahre Einrichtungen, wie der St. Jakob-Park oder das Stucki Shopping entstanden. Allseits besteht die Sorge, dass durch die Vielzahl solcher Einkaufsmoglichkeiten die wirtschaftliche Lage des innenstadtischen Detailhandels verschlechtert werden konnte. Die vorliegende Studie beschaftigt sich mit der Frage, inwieweit die Angebote und das Ambiente von Einkaufzentren einen Einfluss auf die Angebote des etablierten innenstadtischen Detailhandels der Stadt Basel haben. Mit Hilfe eines Fragebogens wurden Kriterien festgestellt, die fur Kunden in der Region Basel wesentlich fur die Wahl eines Einkaufsstandorts sind. Im Fruhjahr 2011 wurden insgesamt 2032 Kunden und Passanten an folgenden Standorten befragt: drei Einkaufszentren (St. Jakob-Park und Stucki Shopping in Basel sowie das Rhein Center in Weil am Rhein) und zwei Einkaufsstrassen (Freie Strasse im Zentrum Basels und die Hauptstrasse in Weil am Rhein) Der Fragebogen erfasste die soziookonomischen Merkmale der Befragten, die Wahl der Transportmittel zum Standort, das Einkaufsverhalten, die mit dem Einkauf verbundenen Aktivitaten und die Kundenzufriedenheit. Die Studie liefert interessante Ergebnisse und gibt mit deren Interpretation wertvolle Anregungen zur Starkung des innenstadtischen Detailhandels Basels.