Game-Theoretic Intention-Aware Planning for Autonomous Vehicles

As Autonomous Vehicles (AVs) navigate through dynamic and constantly changing environments, it is crucial that they take into account the impact of their actions on the decisions of others for safe and efficient interaction with humans. In doing so, they need to anticipate how humans will behave in different situations based on their intentions....

Integrating human drivers' behavioural rules into microscopic traffic simulation

Autonomous vehicles (AVs) can solve a lot of problems related to traffic safety, comfort and congestion. While the sensors used by these vehicles are getting cheaper, more accurate, and software is improving, the first completely automated vehicle does not exist yet. When AVs start gradually driving on the roads, there will be a mixed traffic...

Model-based Integrated Planning and Control of Autonomous Vehicles using Artificial Potential Fields

Navigation systems in an Autonomous Vehicles (AV) can be divided into two parts: a path planning block which takes in the environmental data and rules to design a collision-free obstacle and a vehicle control and tracking block which generates actuator inputs for the AV to follow the reference path generated by the path planning block. Each task...

Omnidirectional Monocular Collision Avoidance Onboard a Quadrotor

Optimal Charging Strategies for Electric Vehicle Fleets

Electric vehicles are a fast-growing market in the automotive sector. In addition, the widespread use of renewable energy to power electric vehicles makes them sustainable, with considerably low greenhouse gas emissions. As a result, service providers are switching to fleets of electric vehicles to promote environmental sustainability. However,...

Multi-Vehicle Scenario-Based Trajectory Optimisation for Automated Driving: An Application to Urban Traffic Situations

Automated driving is where automobiles meet robotics. With the recent advances in intelligence, sensor technology, wireless technology, and computation power, we are inching ever closer to realising full autonomy in a vehicle. We are nowhere near the end of the line, however. Automated vehicles will have to interact with static obstacles like...

Maneuvering and Platooning of Automated Vehicles via Comprehensive Predictive Control: A Numerical Analysis

Ongoing research in autonomous driving currently focuses on creating new applications for autonomous vehicles (AV) and connected autonomous vehicles (CAV). Specifically, motion planning and control solutions are being developed based on the combination of Artificial Potential Functions (APF) with economic Model Predictive Control (eMPC). These...

Optimal bidirectional charging control of Electric Vehicles: Minimizing carbon footprint in a realistic simulation environment

Electricity grids worldwide are experiencing increased peak demands and decreasing simultaneity due to higher shares of Renewable Energy Sources (RES). It is expected that many grids will soon reach their limits. One solution to mitigate these issues is exploiting flexibility in e.g. electric vehicles. In this work, a shrinking horizon model...

Traffic network management: "Comparing algorithms for network-wide traffic management using Eclipse SUMO: A pragmatic approach versus Model Predictive Control"

The need for smart traffic control has grown over the last years. Initiated by an increased amount of traffic. Network-wide traffic control is becoming a more interesting field for traffic control. Mainly because computer power has increased and optimisation techniques improved. Network-wide traffic aims to improve the overall traffic state by...

The Quasi-Online Algorithm in a Robot Packing Environment: Implementation of an Improved Bin Packing Algorithm

Enabling Hybrid Distributed Model Predictive Control of Traffic Signals In Urban Arterial Networks: An on-street application in industry

Road users still encounter unnecessary delays due to inefficient traffic control in urban traffic networks. These delays are ever-increasing and have large environmental and economic consequences. In the Netherlands, most intersections are controlled using actuated controllers, which respond directly to the current traffic demand obtained from...

Guiding Co-Adaptation in Physically Interacting Human-Robot Teams

To make the cooperation within a physical human-robot team as efficient as possible, the team members must be able to co-adapt.<br/>We developed and evaluated a robot that adapts to a human, using an adaptation strategy, in such a way as to guide the co-adaptation to have a positive effect on human task contribution and team performance. <br/>A...

An agent-based opinion dynamics model with a language model-based belief system: Bridging language and opinion modeling

As society's mutual problems grow, there is an increasing demand for understanding the intra- and inter-cultural differences. Rising polarization within national borders and stranded dialogues between nations on mutual problems, daily reach the headlines. It is argued that current models of opinion only scratch the surface of actual human...

Forecasting of electric vehicle load profiles: Predicting the uncontrolled load stemming from a large group of electric vehicles as input for trading on energy markets

Exploiting electric vehicles for maintaining a stable electricity grid is a promising opportunity, which is recognized by both the academic and industrial world. Although the concept is relatively simple, the operating space containing many different stakeholders, rules and legislation is not. There are various practical issues that complicate...

Multi-Agent Source Seeking in Unknown Environments: A hybrid adaptive feedback approach for unicycles

The application of autonomous robotic vehicles to explore unknown environments is a growing field of interest in the research community. This thesis report studies the practical implementation of employing three autonomous vehicles to navigate towards a signal emitting source in an unknown environment. The group of autonomous vehicles is...

Vector field formation control: Fixed-wing formation control based on time-varying vector field

The mission control of a fixed-wings UAV is slightly more complex compared to other models like quad-rotors or unicycles since the dynamic of a fixed-wing aircraft does not allow rapid direction changes or stop-rotate-go type of movements. Those restriction needs to be taken into consideration when building a mission control system, moreover,...

Distributed formation control of non-holonomic mobile robots: Implementation and testing in Robot Operating System

The use of distributed multi-agent formation control for non-holonomic mobile robots shows great promise in practical environments. In this thesis, a Robot Operating System (ROS) package is developed in which various formation control algorithms are implemented for use on a group of skid-steer drive mobile robots. These formation control...

Distributed Model Predictive Control for Multi-Vehicle Autonomous Driving: Cooperative vs. Non-cooperative Control

In this thesis, we consider the problem of controlling multiple autonomous vehicles in a highway scenario, via MPC. By iteratively solving a motion planning OCP, MPC is perfectly suited for unknown dynamic environments, while optimally computing path and vehicle inputs. Moreover, MPC can ensure the satisfaction of collision avoidance constraints...