- document
-
Coppola, M. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)In this work, we optimize the behavior of swarm agents in a pattern formation task. We start with a local behavior, expressed as a local state-action map, that has been formally proven to lead the swarm to always eventually form the desired pattern. We seek to optimize this for performance while keeping the formal proof. First, the state...conference paper 2018
- document
-
McGuire, K.N. (author), Coppola, M. (author), de Wagter, C. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Pocket-drones are inherently safe for flight near humans, and their small size allows maneuvering through narrow indoor environments. However, achieving autonomous flight of pocket-drones is challenging because of strict on-board hardware limitations. Further challenges arise when multiple pocket-drones operate as a team and need to coordinate...conference paper 2017
- document
-
Silva, Joao Paulo (author), de Wagter, C. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)This paper proposes a trajectory planning and control strategy to optimally visit a given set of waypoints in the presence of wind. First, aerodynamic properties of quadrotors which affect trajectory planning and tracking performance are investigated. Blade flapping, induced and parasitic drag are derived and an extended method to identify all...journal article 2017
- document
-
de Wagter, C. (author), Karasek, M. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)We present a novel design of a tailless flapping wing Micro Air Vehicle (MAV), which uses four independently driven pairs of flapping wings in order to fly and perform agile maneuvers. The wing pairs are arranged such that differential thrust generates the desired roll and pitch moments, similar to a quadrotor. Moreover, two pairs of wings are...conference paper 2017
- document
-
Ho, H.W. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), Chu, Q. P. (author)Monocular vision is increasingly used in micro air vehicles for navigation. In particular, optical flow, inspired by flying insects, is used to perceive vehicle movement with respect to the surroundings or sense changes in the environment. However, optical flow does not directly provide us the distance to an object or velocity, but the ratio...journal article 2017
- document
-
McGuire, K.N. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), de Wagter, C. (author), Tuyls, Karl (author), Kappen, Hilbert (author)Micro Aerial Vehicles (FOV) are very suitable for flying in indoor environments, but autonomous navigation is challenging due to their strict hardware limitations. This paper presents a highly efficient computer vision algorithm called Edge-FS for the determination of velocity and depth. It runs at 20 Hz on a 4 g stereo camera with an embedded...journal article 2017
- document
- Armanini, S.F. (author), de Visser, C.C. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), Aguiar Vieira Caetano, J.V. (author) conference paper 2017
- document
-
Scheper, K.Y.W. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)One of the major challenges of evolutionary robotics is to transfer robot controllers evolved in simulation to robots in the real world. In this article, we investigate abstraction of the sensory inputs and motor actions as a tool to tackle this problem. Abstraction in robots is simply the use of preprocessed sensory inputs and low-level closed...journal article 2017
- document
-
Armanini, S.F. (author), Karasek, M. (author), de Visser, C.C. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), Mulder, Max (author)<br/>conference paper 2017
- document
- Armanini, S.F. (author), Karasek, M. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), de Visser, C.C. (author) journal article 2017
- document
-
Scheper, K.Y.W. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)One of the major challenges of Evolutionary Robotics is to transfer robot controllers evolved in simulation to robots in the real world. In this article, we investigate abstraction on the sensory inputs and motor actions as a potential solution to this problem. Abstraction means that the robot uses preprocessed sensory inputs and closed loop low...conference paper 2016
- document
-
Scheper, K.Y.W. (author), Tijmons, S. (author), de Visser, C.C. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Evolutionary Robotics allows robots with limited sensors and processing to tackle complex tasks by means of sensory-motor coordination. In this article we show the first application of the Behavior Tree framework on a real robotic platform using the evolutionary robotics methodology. This framework is used to improve the intelligibility of the...journal article 2016
- document
-
de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)The visual cue of optical flow plays an important role in the navigation of flying insects, and is increasingly studied for use by small flying robots as well. A major problem is that successful optical flow control seems to require distance estimates, while optical flow is known to provide only the ratio of velocity to distance. In this article...journal article 2016
- document
-
van Dalen, G.J.J. (author), McGuire, K.N. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Autonomous navigation is a major challenge in the development of Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs). Especially when an algorithm has to be efficient, insect intelligence can be a source of inspiration. An elementary navigation task is homing, which means autonomously returning to the initial location. A promising approach uses learned visual...conference paper 2016
- document
-
Ho, H.W. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), Chu, Q. P. (author)Monocular vision is increasingly used in Micro Air Vehicles for navigation. In particular, optical flow, inspired by flying insects, is used to perceive vehicles’ movement with respect to the surroundings or sense changes in the environment. However, optical flow does not directly provide us the distance to an object or velocity, but the ratio...conference paper 2016
- document
-
Cunis, T. (author), Karasek, M. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Flapping-wing MAVs represent an attractive alternative to conventional designs with rotary wings, since they promise a much higher efficiency in forward flight. However, further insight into the flapping-wing aerodynamics is still needed to get closer to the flight performance observed in natural fliers. Here we present the first step necessary...conference paper 2016
- document
-
Karasek, M. (author), Koopmans, J.A. (author), Armanini, S.F. (author), Remes, B.D.W. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Despite an intensive research on flapping flight and flapping wing MAVs in recent years, there are still no accurate models of flapping flight dynamics. This is partly due to lack of free flight data, in particular during manoeuvres. In this work, we present, for the first time, a comparison of free flight forces estimated using solely an on...conference paper 2016
- document
-
McGuire, K.N. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author), de Wagter, C. (author), Remes, B.D.W. (author), Tuyls, K. (author), Kappen, H. (author)Autonomous flight of pocket drones is challenging due to the severe limitations on on-board energy, sensing, and processing power. However, tiny drones have great potential as their small size allows maneuvering through narrow spaces while their small weight provides significant safety advantages. This paper presents a computationally efficient...conference paper 2016
- document
-
Lamers, K. (author), Tijmons, S. (author), de Wagter, C. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Obstacle detection by monocular vision is challenging because a single camera does not provide a direct measure for absolute distances to objects. A self-supervised learning approach is proposed that combines a camera and a very small short-range proximity sensor to find the relation between the appearance of objects in camera images and their...conference paper 2016
- document
-
Smeur, E.J.J. (author), Chu, Q. P. (author), de Croon, G.C.H.E. (author)Incremental nonlinear dynamic inversion is a sensor-based control approach that promises to provide high-performance nonlinear control without requiring a detailed model of the controlled vehicle. In the context of attitude control of micro air vehicles, incremental nonlinear dynamic inversion only uses a control effectiveness model and uses...journal article 2016