Maximum Likelihood Estimation of Linear Time-Varying Pilot-Vehicle System Parameters

The Contribution of Visual Feedback to Movement Control in a Visuomotor Tracking Task

The aim of this study was to determine if and how specific characteristics of visual information influence the motor control strategy adopted during a visuomotor tracking task. To this end, twenty healthy subjects and two stroke patients were measured. Changes in wrist joint admittance (i.e., wrist rotations due to external forces) due to...

Validating a Human Controller Model for Preview Tracking Tasks: Identification of the Effects of Spatial Occlusion using Eye-Tracking

This paper presents an experimental validation of a recently developed two-point human controller (HC) model for preview tracking tasks. During a human-in-the-loop experiment, subjects tracked identical target signals with zero preview, 1.5 seconds of preview, and two occlusion conditions, blocking either the 0-0.5 s, or 0.35-0.85 s region from...

Auto-tuning and Re-calibration of Controller Parameters by Identification of Control Loading Parameters

This paper is on auto-tuning of controller parameters by deriving the external linkage physical parameters. Based on the change in linkage parameters, the actuator parameters are tuned in the software that drives it. The linkage parameters are estimated using a nonlinear least square solver. The least squares estimator used in this paper is the...

Nonlinear System Identification and Control for Autonomous Robots

Most robots receive information about their own dynamics or about their environment before starting to work on their tasks. This makes them less fit for operating in unknown environments without human supervision. In this thesis, the goal is to let a robot learn the relation between its actions and perceptions autonomously. This problem is...

Adaptive Incremental Backstepping Flight Control

This thesis deals with the development of Adaptive Incremental Backstepping control laws for a high-performance aircraft model (F-16), in order to make the airplane robustly seek references in roll rate and angle of attack at a constant airspeed while minimizing sideslip. An Incremental Backstepping scheme that relies on estimates of the angular...

A Tracking Task for Quantifying Loss of Motor Skills due to Parkinson’s Disease

This paper investigated if a pursuit tracking task could be used to quantify the loss of motor skills due to Parkinson's disease (PD) by using system identification methods. A human-in-the-loop experiment consisting of PD patients and a healthy age-gender matched control group was conducted at the Erasmus University Medical Center. A pursuit...

Gaussian Process Regression for Data-Driven Model Predictive Control

Systems and Control deals with modelling and control design of many different types of systems with different behaviour and characteristics. Often times it is challenging to build mathematical models to describe the system dynamics due to limited knowledge of the underlying system, complex nonlinearities, or the existence of unknown exogenous...

Investigating and Modeling the Effects of Speed in Lane Keeping on Winding Roads

Accurate models of driver steering behavior are essential with ever-growing automation in road vehicles. In this project, the effects of driving speed on steering behavior on winding roads are investigated and modeled. Data were collected in a human-in-the-loop curve driving experiment with fifteen participants, who were asked to drive at five...

Investigating the Difference Between Single and Dual Axis Manual Control

Aircraft manual control tasks require simultane- ous control of multiple degrees-of-freedom. Unfortunately, most multi-axis human-operator modeling is limited to the modeling of multiple fully-independent axis. Therefore our goal is to contribute to the understanding of multi-axis manual control behaviour and develop a more realistic picture of...

Identifying intrinsic and reflexive properties of the low-back by inertial loading

Abnormal neuromuscular control (NMC) has been suggested as a cause or effect of a-specific low back pain. This study aimed to gain more insight into the stabilization of the low back during postural control by developing a method to study the intrinsic and reflexive components of NMC. Inertial loading of the trunk by perturbation of subjects on...

Quantifying the effect of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis on the neural and non-neural properties of the wrist

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is themost frequent form of motor neuron diseases (MND). This neurodegenerativedisease progresses relentlessly quick. The characteristic feature of ALS is theconcurrent degeneration of the upper and lower motoneurons (UMN & LMN) inthe central and peripheral nervous system. Symptomatic...

Investigating the Use of Visual Information in Lane Keeping Tasks: A replication study of the Land & Horwood experiment

In car driving, manual control to keep a vehicle within its lane is mainly performed based on visual information of the road ahead. Linear models describing behavior in such tasks can therefore be directly based on the human perception of the visual scene, although it is currently unclear how this perception guides control behavior. In...