Artificial Intelligence and Robotics

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Artificial Intelligence and Robotics
EU-MOP
Dennis FritschFraunhofer-Institutefor
Manufacturing Engineering andAutomation (IPA)
Athens, June 2006
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Introduction

• The EU-MOP robots should be able to response to
  oil spills autonomously.
• Autonomously means that each unit will have an
  energy system and an oil skimming device as well
  as that the EU-MOP units will make its own
  decisions how to response to the oil spill.
• Thus, each unit needs (artificial) intelligence,
  which will be given to the units with the help of
  sensors and control systems.

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Control of the EU-MOP units

• In order to achieve an highly robust and flexible
  oil response system the swarm intelligence
  approach has been selected as control paradigm
  for the EU-MOP robots.
• Thus, the EU-MOP swarm is a homogeneous group of
  robots without any hierarchies or central control
  system.

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Control of the EU-MOP units

• Example Oil spill in a harbour, several very
  small patches of oil have to be recovered

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Control of the EU-MOP units

• Strategy of each robot

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Control of the EU-MOP units
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Control of the EU-MOP units
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Control of the EU-MOP units
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Control of the EU-MOP units
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Control of the EU-MOP units
Thus, the EU-MOP system will be very flexible
and fault-tolerant.
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Sensors for the EU-MOP robots

• Nevertheless, the EU-MOP robots will need several
  sensors, e.g.
• for the detection of oil or the measurement of
  the thickness of the oil spill,
• for absolute or relative positioning of itself,
  its neighbours, all other units, the mother ship,
  etc.,
• for the detection of collisions with other units,
  shipwrecks, debris etc.,
• for winds, currents, etc.,
• for the internal state of the unit (malfunction,
  full of oil, energy low etc.)
• as well as a communication system for
  communication with other units, with the mother
  ship and with a human operator.

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Sensors for the EU-MOP robots

• Sensors might increase the performance of the
  robots, nevertheless, sensors also have
  disadvantages, e.g.
• increased costs
• increased weight and volume
• increased consumption of power
• increased amount of information that has to be
  processed
• Thus, the question is What is the best sensor
  configuration for the EU-MOP robots? And related
  to that What are the best strategies in order to
  response to the oil spill.
• These questions will be answered with the help of
  the simulation technique.

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Architecture of the simulation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Oil Fate model

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Robot / Swarm Simulation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

water
oil slick
harbour
coast
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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

1 unit
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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Visualisation

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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Comparison of two types of swarms
• swarm A consists of units without oil sensor
• swarm B consists of units with oil sensor.

type B will be able to move intelligent
type A will not be able to move intelligent
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Simulation of the EU-MOP robots

• Comparison of two types of swarms
• Conclusion (for this scenario)
• The larger the swarm the better the recovery
  time.
• The better the sensor configuration the better
  the recovery time.
• Nevertheless, the swarm without oil sensors
  reaches for large swarm sizes more or less the
  same recovery time as the swarm with oil sensor.

Swarm size (N) 1 2 3 4 5 10 20
Recovery time of swarm A 52627 20496 16843 14170 13207 5564 2905
Recovery time of swarm B 37293 14416 11360 9132 8134 4026 2860
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Conclusion

• The simulation will be able to determine
• the recovery time,
• the energy consumption,
• the quantity of recovery oil
• the quantity of oil that polluted the coast,
• etc.
• These date will be the basis
• for an assessment of the EU-MOP units, and
• for a cost-benefit-analysis.
• Thus, this proceeding will ensure that the EU-MOP
  consortium will develop a highly effective,
  flexible and robust oil response system.