Projects / emss / Introduction to Robotics
From emss Framework - iRobot Create C++ Framework
You are here: Projects / emss / Introduction to Robotics
[edit] Introduction to Robotics
Selected text from KrusiGrob08
Robotics (rō-bŏt'ĭks). To most people this singular noun with Russian roots1 causes a spark in the imagination leading to some sort of alien emotion the human has not yet gotten completely familiar with. Whether the emotion points towards interest, fascination, hunger for understanding, curiosity, or even fear, it most certainly seems something quite new; something of the 20th century. Seems however cannot be stressed enough, as robotics is nothing new, yet alone something of the 20th century. Robotics goes back well beyond hundreds of years, where Arab inventors, such as the Mesopotamian scholar Al-Jazira, were hard at work. The creation of a programmable humanoid band of robotic musicians by Al-Jazira (Fowler, 1967) leaves a startling impression on the history of robotics. Followed by numerous inventions, the Jacques de Vaucanson's Digesting Duck (Wood, 2002) shows us the well-developed hunger humans have to breathe life into their creations. This brings us to the mainstream understanding of robot, a term not even a hundred years old (Čapek, 1921). However, in our time robotics has rooted itself with a new purpose, drifting from the fantastical humanoids and casting anchor in the industrial arena as a faithful servant to mankind.
The modern robot, navigating far away planets and welding circuits with micro-meter precision, is far from the 1940's romantic idea of robotics depicted in Leave It To Roll-Oh (Handy, 1940). Robots don't serve us breakfast in the morning; neither do they take our hat or coats from us when we return home in the evening. Furthermore, they don't seem to clean our house while we are gone. Here again, the word seem, should be examined closer. We see that while we are gone, robots clean our dishes, wash our clothes, and more commonly even vacuum our floors and cut our grass. Maybe the progression of the robot has taken a more subtle path than originally imagined. Nonetheless one could argue these are nothing but machines performing trivial pre-programmed tasks – true depending on your perception of what constitutes a robot. We will let the reader decide.
So, why robotics? What is so significant and interesting about automated machines? Naturally, there are many different answers coming from many perspectives, but in our opinion the answer has something to do with mankind’s (yet to be?) greatest birth: the artificial being. The significance and importance of creating life needs not to be discussed further (we assume), so in turn we feel creating an artificial being of intelligence holds the same, or at least similar, importance. However, a robot in its essence does not constitute an artificial being at all, as it is just a pre-programmed machine, but we recognize that it is a subset of the embodiment of artificial intelligence, and surely plays an important role. Furthermore, as mankind continues to strengthen their reliance on machines, the field of robotics will become increasingly important. Understanding how machines work has been finely crafted over the centuries through the aid of mechanical and electrical engineering, et al. Now more than ever it is time to explore the behavior of machines. What better way to do so than in the field of robotics? Is this not the study, development, and application of machine behavior? This, however, is not a proposal for building a Robotics and Artificial Intelligence lab, but rather a teaser and justification for our passion in robotics, so let us continue.
A fundamental problem in robotics is the perception of the environment. To us humans, this is a trivial task. We see, hear, and touch our environment around us, combining these senses to form a somewhat indescribable organic perception of the world (Thorpe, Clatz, Duggins, Gowdy, MacLachlan, & Ryan, 2001). In order for a robot to successfully, and flexibly, function in a shared environment, it must be able to perceive it first. For thousands of years we have tried to understand and imitate our perceptions, starting with primitive cave drawings and slowly mastering perception with realistic paintings. More recently, man has continued this practice by creating photographs, audio recorders, and motion pictures. However, mimicking perception is a different dimension than understanding perception. A robot can easily imitate its environment through the form of radar, sonar, lidar, or visual images, but understanding it has proven (surprisingly) difficult. None-the-less, the successful perception of the environment is an important prerequisite to many functions of a mobile robot. Being able to stop before driving down stairs, avoid hitting walls, and plan efficient paths through space all involve the mapping of the physical environment through the robots perception.
One of the greatest restrictions robots face today is lack of self-sustainability. Most robots rely on direct external influences to remain “alive”, such as the exchange of battery packs or connection to a power supply. A robot that advances progression must prove to be self-sustainable. In other words, this means that a robot must be able to take care of itself, providing the necessary resources it needs, without external help. Looking at the classical design of a mobile robot, consisting of wheels, motors, and processing units, the underlying resource common to all components is electricity. In mobile robots this resources is stored in a battery, which the robot consequently must carry with at all time. When the battery is depleted, the game of life is over and the robot dies. To live, the robot is reliable on an external influence, which consequently cares for the robot and recharges it. Becoming self-sustainable requires such a robot to care for itself, recharging when necessary. This task is not so trivial, and in our human environment moderately complex. Such a robot must master the art of navigation, finding its way back to a power source when needed. But the rewards are large; it is the first step to self-sustainability for the modern robot.
