Finding optimal paths in connected graphs requires determining the smallest total cost for traveling along the graph's edges. This problem can be solved by several classical algorithms, where, usually, costs are predefined for all edges. Conventional planning methods can, thus, normally not be used when wanting to change costs in an adaptive way following the requirements of some task. Here, we show that one can define a neural network representation of path-finding problems by transforming cost values into synaptic weights, which allows for online weight adaptation using network learning mechanisms. When starting with an initial activity value of one, activity propagation in this network will lead to solutions, which are identical to those found by the Bellman-Ford (BF) algorithm. The neural network has the same algorithmic complexity as BF, and, in addition, we can show that network learning mechanisms (such as Hebbian learning) can adapt the weights in the network augmenting the resulting paths according to some task at hand. We demonstrate this by learning to navigate in an environment with obstacles as well as by learning to follow certain sequences of path nodes. Hence, the here-presented novel algorithm may open up a different regime of applications where path augmentation (by learning) is directly coupled with path finding in a natural way.

Trajectory or path planning is a fundamental issue in a wide variety of applications. In this article, we show that it is possible to solve path planning on a maze for multiple start point and endpoint highly efficiently with a novel configuration of multilayer networks that use only weighted pooling operations, for which no network training is needed. These networks create solutions, which are identical to those from classical algorithms such as breadth-first search (BFS), Dijkstra's algorithm, or TD(0). Different from competing approaches, very large mazes containing almost one billion nodes with dense obstacle configuration and several thousand importance-weighted path endpoints can this way be solved quickly in a single pass on parallel hardware.

In this article, we present a generic locomotion control framework for legged robots and a strategy for control policy optimization. The framework is based on neural control and black-box optimization. The neural control combines a central pattern generator (CPG) and a radial basis function (RBF) network to create a CPG-RBF network. The control network acts as a neural basis to produce arbitrary rhythmic trajectories for the joints of robots. The main features of the CPG-RBF network are: 1) it is generic since it can be applied to legged robots with different morphologies; 2) it has few control parameters, resulting in fast learning; 3) it is scalable, both in terms of policy/trajectory complexity and the number of legs that can be controlled using similar trajectories; 4) it does not rely heavily on sensory feedback to generate locomotion and is thus less prone to sensory faults; and 5) once trained, it is simple, minimal, and intuitive to use and analyze. These features will lead to an easy-to-use framework with fast convergence and the ability to encode complex locomotion control policies. In this work, we show that the framework can successfully be applied to three different simulated legged robots with varying morphologies and, even broken joints, to learn locomotion control policies. We also show that after learning, the control policies can also be successfully transferred to a real-world robot without any modifications. We, furthermore, show the scalability of the framework by implementing it as a central controller for all legs of a robot and as a decentralized controller for individual legs and leg pairs. By investigating the correlation between robot morphology and encoding type, we are able to present a strategy for control policy optimization. Finally, we show how sensory feedback can be integrated into the CPG-RBF network to enable online adaptation.

Path planning is important for robot action execution, since a path or a motion trajectory for a particular action has to be defined first before the action can be executed. Most of the current approaches are iterative methods where the trajectory is generated by predicting the next state based on the current state. Here we propose a novel method by utilising a fully convolutional neural network, which allows generation of complete paths even for several agents with one network prediction iteration. We demonstrate that our method is able to successfully generate optimal or close to optimal paths (less than 10% longer) in more than 99% of the cases for single path predictions in 2D and 3D environments. Furthermore, we show that the network is - without specific training on such cases - able to create (close to) optimal paths in 96% of the cases for two and in 84% of the cases for three simultaneously generated paths.

Human-robot interaction strongly benefits from fast, predictive action recognition. For us this is relatively easy but difficult for a robot. To address this problem, here we present a novel prediction algorithm for manipulation action classes in video sequences. Manipulations are first represented using the Enriched Semantic Event Chain (ESEC) framework. This creates a temporal sequence of static and dynamic spatial relations between the objects that take part in the manipulation by which an action can be quickly recognized. We measured performance on 32 ideal as well as real manipulations and compared our method also against a state of the art trajectory-based HMM method for action recognition. We observe that manipulations can be correctly predicted after only (on average) 45% of action's total time and that we are almost twice as fast as the HMM-based method. Finally, we demonstrate the advantage of this framework in a simple robot demonstration comparing two different approaches.

Trajectory generation methods play an important role in robotics since they are essential for the execution of actions. In this paper we present a novel trajectory generation method for generalization of accurate movements with boundary conditions. Our approach originates from optimal control theory and is based on a second order dynamic system. We evaluate our method and compare it to state-of-the-art movement generation methods in both simulations and a real robot experiment. We show that the new method is very compact in its representation and can reproduce demonstrated trajectories with zero error. Moreover, it has most of the properties of the state-of-the-art trajectory generation methods such as robustness to perturbations and generalisation to new boundary position and velocity conditions. We believe that, due to these features, our method has great potential for various robotic applications, especially, where high accuracy is required, for example, in industrial and medical robotics.

Image based object classification requires clean training data sets. Gathering such sets is usually done manually by humans, which is time-consuming and laborious. On the other hand, directly using images from search engines creates very noisy data due to ambiguous noun-focused indexing. However, in daily speech nouns and verbs are always coupled. We use this for the automatic generation of clean data sets by the here-presented TRANSCLEAN algorithm, which through the use of multiple languages also solves the problem of polyesters (a single spelling with multiple meanings). Thus, we use the implicit knowledge contained in verbs, e.g. in an imperative such as "hit the nail", implicating a metal nail and not the fingernail. One type of reference application where this method can automatically operate is human-robot collaboration based on discourse. A second is the generation of clean image data sets, where tedious manual cleaning can be replaced by the much simpler manual generation of a single relevant verb-noun tuple. Here we show the impact of our improved training sets for several widely used and state-of-the-art classifiers including Multipath Hierarchical Matching Pursuit. All tested classifiers show a substantial boost of about +20% in recognition performance.

The idea that connected convex surfaces, separated by concave boundaries, play an important role for the perception of objects and their decomposition into parts has been discussed for a long time. Based on this idea, we present a new bottom-up approach for the segmentation of 3D point clouds into object parts. The algorithm approximates a scene using an adjacency-graph of spatially connected surface patches. Edges in the graph are then classified as either convex or concave using a novel, strictly local criterion. Region growing is employed to identify locally convex connected subgraphs, which represent the object parts. We show quantitatively that our algorithm, although conceptually easy to graph and fast to compute, produces results that are comparable to far more complex state-of-the-art methods which use classification, learning and model fitting. This suggests that convexity/concavity is a powerful feature for object partitioning using 3D data. Furthermore we demonstrate that for many objects a natural decomposition into “handle and body” emerges when employing our method. We exploit this property in a robotic application enabling a robot to automatically grasp objects by their handles.

Robust visual tracking is an essential precursor to understanding and replicating human actions in robotic systems. In order to accurately evaluate the semantic meaning of a sequence of video frames, or to replicate an action contained therein, one must be able to coherently track and segment all observed agents and objects. This work proposes a novel online point cloud based algorithm which simultaneously tracks 6DoF pose and determines spatial extent of all entities in indoor scenarios. This is accomplished using a persistent supervoxel world-model which is updated, rather than replaced, as new frames of data arrive. Maintenance of a world model enables general object permanence, permitting successful tracking through full occlusions. Object models are tracked using a bank of independent adaptive particle filters which use a supervoxel observation model to give rough estimates of object state. These are united using a novel multi-model RANSAC-like approach, which seeks to minimize a global energy function associating world-model supervoxels to predicted states. We present results on a standard robotic assembly benchmark for two application scenarios - human trajectory imitation and semantic action understanding - demonstrating the usefulness of the tracking in intelligent robotic systems.

The generation of complex movement patterns, in particular, in cases where one needs to smoothly and accurately join trajectories in a dynamic way, is an important problem in robotics. This paper presents a novel joining method that is based on the modification of the original dynamic movement primitive formulation. The new method can reproduce the target trajectory with high accuracy regarding both the position and the velocity profile and produces smooth and natural transitions in position space, as well as in velocity space. The properties of the method are demonstrated by its application to simulated handwriting generation, which are also shown on a robot, where an adaptive algorithm is used to learn trajectories from human demonstration. These results demonstrate that the new method is a feasible alternative for joining of movement sequences, which has a high potential for all robotics applications where trajectory joining is required.

The generation of complex movement patterns, in particular in cases where one needs to smoothly and accurately join trajectories, is still a difficult problem in robotics. This paper presents a novel approach for joining of several dynamic movement primitives (DMPs) based on a modification of the original formulation for DMPs. The new method produces smooth and natural transitions in position as well as velocity space. The properties of the method are demonstrated by applying it to simulated handwriting generation implemented on a robot, where an adaptive algorithm is used to learn trajectories from human demonstration. These results demonstrate that the new method is a feasible alternative for trajectory learning and generation and its accuracy and modular character has potential for various robotics applications.

This paper presents a novel method for trajectory generation based on dynamic movement primitives (DMPs) treated from a control theoretical perspective. We extended the key ideas from the original DMP formalism by introducing a velocity convergence mechanism in the reformulated system. Theoretical proof is given to guarantee its validity. The new method can deal with complex paths as a whole. Based on this, we can generate smooth trajectories with automatically generated transition zones, satisfy position- and velocity boundary conditions at start and endpoint with high precision, and support multiple via-point applications. Theoretic proof of this method and experiments are presented.

Human walking is a dynamic, partly self-stabilizing process relying on the interaction of the biomechanical design with its neuronal control. The coordination of this process is a very difficult problem, and it has been suggested that it involves a hierarchy of levels, where the lower ones, e.g., interactions between muscles and the spinal cord, are largely autonomous, and where higher level control (e.g., cortical) arises only pointwise, as needed. This requires an architecture of several nested, sensori-motor loops where the walking process provides feedback signals to the walker's sensory systems, which can be used to coordinate its movements. To complicate the situation, at a maximal walking speed of more than four leg-lengths per second, the cycle period available to coordinate all these loops is rather short. In this study we present a planar biped robot, which uses the design principle of nested loops to combine the self-stabilizing properties of its biomechanical design with several levels of neuronal control. Specifically, we show how to adapt control by including online learning mechanisms based on simulated synaptic plasticity. This robot can walk with a high speed (>3.0 leg length/s), self-adapting to minor disturbances, and reacting in a robust way to abruptly induced gait changes. At the same time, it can learn walking on different terrains, requiring only few learning experiences. This study shows that the tight coupling of physical with neuronal control, guided by sensory feedback from the walking pattern itself, combined with synaptic learning may be a way forward to better understand and solve coordination problems in other complex motor tasks.

In Figure The incorrect Froude number given for human walking (0.24) corresponds to 1.5m/s, which is closer to the preferred speed of human walking. The correct number now given (2.4) corresponds to a speed of about 4.6m/s.