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Dipankar Bhattacharya

Publications and source records attributed to Dipankar Bhattacharya.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources

Precise Top-Layer Fabric Segmentation for Fabric Destacking with Edge- and Shape-Aware Deep Networks

Fabric destacking requires precise segmentation of the topmost fabric layer, a task complicated by subtle fabric boundaries and high visual similarity between fabric layers. Existing semantic and edge-based segmentation approaches often struggle with these complexities, limiting the performance of robotic manipulation for different tasks. In this work, a novel segmentation training architecture tailored for top-layer fabric segmentation in stacked fabrics is proposed. The method extends the classical encoder-decoder framework by introducing two specialized branches - an edge-aware branch and a shape-aware branch - that are used to supervise the backbone network for better tuning. The edge-aware branch enhances boundary delineation, while the shape-aware branch guides the network to capture and align the overall fabric shape with reference masks derived from Computer Aided Design (CAD) models. Experiments on a real-world fabric dataset demonstrate that the training approach outperforms established baselines, verifying the effectiveness of the multi-branch design through both quantitative results and ablation studies.

cs.CV

RoSE: A Robotic Soft Esophagus for Endoprosthetic Stent Testing

Soft robotic systems are well suited for developing devices for biomedical applications. A bio-mimicking robotic soft esophagus (RoSE) is developed as an in vitro testing device of endoprosthetic stents for dysphagia management. Endoprosthetic stent placement is an immediate and cost-effective therapy for dysphagia caused by malignant esophageal strictures from esophageal cancer. However, later stage complications, like stent migration, could weaken swallow efficacy in the esophagus. The stent radial force (RF) on the esophageal wall is pivotal in avoiding stent migration. Due to limited randomized controlled trials in patients, stent design and stenting guidelines remain incomplete. To address this knowledge deficit, we investigate RoSE by implanting two stents (A and B) of different radial stiffness characteristics, to measure stent RF and its effect on migration. Endoscopic manometry under peristalsis is also performed to study the impact of stenting and stent dysfunction on intra-bolus pressure signatures (IBPSs) and swallowing efficacy. Each implanted stent undergoes experiments with varied peristalsis velocity, wavelength, and bolus concentrations. The results show that stiffer stent B has a higher RF, whereas stent A maintains a lower RF profile due to lesser stiffness. High RF is necessary to minimize migration under prolonged peristaltic contractions in RoSE. For manometry, stent A slightly increases IBPS, but stiffer stent B significantly decreases IBPS, especially for higher-concentration boluses. If a stiffer stent buckles, it can reduce swallow efficacy and cause recurrent dysphagia. RoSE is therefore an innovative soft robotic platform for testing endoprosthetic stents and addressing clinical challenges in stent evaluation.

cs.RO

Nonlinear Model Predictive Control of a Robotic Soft Esophagus

Strictures caused by esophageal cancer can narrow down the esophageal lumen, leading to dysphagia. Palliation of dysphagia has driven the development of a Robotic Soft Esophagus (RoSE), which provides a novel in vitro platform for esophageal stent testing and food viscosity studies. In RoSE, peristaltic wave generation and control were done in an open-loop manner since the conduit lacked visibility and embedded sensing capability. Hence, in this work, RoSE version 2.0 (RoSEv2.0) is designed with embedded Time Of Flight (TOF) and pressure sensors to measure conduit displacement and air pressure, respectively, for modeling and control. Model Predictive Control (MPC) of RoSEv2.0 is implemented to govern the peristalsis and air pressure profile autonomously. The implemented MPC used Sparse Identification Nonlinear Dynamics with Control (SINDYC) models to estimate the future states of ROSEv2.0. The dynamic models are discovered from the TOF and pressure sensor data. Peristalsis waves of speed 20 mm/s, wavelength 75 mm, and amplitudes 5, 7.5, and 10 mm were successfully generated by the MPC. Additionally, RoSEv2.0 with the MPC was employed to perform stent migration testing with various food bolus consistencies. The major contribution claimed in this paper is the application of SINDYC-based MPC to solve the closed-loop control problem of RoSE for achieving desired peristaltic waves.

cs.RO

Automated Straight-line Sewing of Stretchable Fabrics with Different Lengths

Different Length Alignment Sewing (DLAS), which involves stretching the shorter fabric to match the longer one and sewing them together in a straight line, is a challenging task that needs to satisfy several requirements when automating the sewing process. To address the challenges, this research proposes a novel robotic sewing system, Different Length Robotic Sewing System (DLRoSS), which consists of a roller type end-effector, attached to a 6-DoF manipulator. The end-effector composed of active shorter and longer fabric rollers, and a passive press-roller attached to the shorter-fabric roller. Assuming that one end of the two fabric layers are initially positioned under the sewing machine's presser foot, the system automates DLAS by operating in four distinct phases. (P1) Fabric wrapping: Individual fabric layers are picked, held, and wrapped from the other end onto the feed rollers. (P2) Sewing: During the sewing, the shorter fabric is stretched and aligned with the longer fabric in real-time using roller velocity control based on the sewing speed and apriori known length ratio. (P3) Sewing completion: In the final sewing round on the fabric rollers, the press roller is engaged to prevent the stretched fabric from slipping off due to internal tension. (P4) Sewing fabric release: At the end of sewing, the fabric edge moves past the press roller, and the fabric releases from the rollers. Experimental results demonstrate that DLRoSS achieves consistent, high-quality sewing of stretchable fabrics of different materials and lengths.

cs.RO

Tri-Space Operational Control of Redundant Multilink and Hybrid Cable-Driven Parallel Robots Using an Iterative-Learning based Reactive Approach

Cable-Driven Parallel Robots (CDPRs) are a type of parallel mechanism in which cables are used as actuators. Due to the two levels of redundancy and numerous constraints within the CDPR actuation, joint and operational spaces (together known as the tri-space), tracking a given trajectory in the operational space while satisfying constraints in tri-space simultaneously is challenging. To the best of the authors' knowledge, there does not exist any tri-space control framework, which is robust, effective, and directly applicable to several architectures of redundantly actuated CDPRs. This paper proposes a tri-space control framework that combines Reactive Control (RC) and Iterative-Learning Control (ILC) to perform repetitive tasks in the operational space. The framework allows the tracking of operational space trajectories online with feasible cable forces, while avoiding undesirable situations such as cable-link interference, joint interference, and loss of manipulability. On the other hand, by finding an optimal parameter in the null space using a novel parameterization of a null space vector, the performance can be improved through ILC when the task is repeatedly executed. Simulation and hardware results on various Multilink Cable-Driven Robot (MCDRs) and Hybrid Cable-Driven Robots (HCDRs) show that the proposed tri-space control framework can be conveniently and effectively applied to the real-time control of different CDPRs.

cs.RO

Pulsar glitches in the presence of vortex traps

Pulsar glitches are thought to originate when angular momentum is transferred to the crust of the neutron star from the superfluid enclosed within, mediated by vortex avalanches. This idea has been qualitatively validated in the existing literature by simulating a star with a small number ($\sim 10^{3}$) of superfluid vortices, subject to deceleration and uniform pinning. Here, we employ the Barnes-Hut approximation to simulate up to $10^{5}$ vortices in a reasonable time. Using the new setup, we probe glitches that originate in the presence of inhomogeneous pinning. The inner crust of a neutron star is expected to crack as the star spins down, relieving stresses and resulting in rearrangements within the crustal lattice. These regions become centres for pinning with large pinning energies. Many such vortex traps are expected to exist in mature pulsars like Vela. We simulate one such star and find that the rise of the glitch is now staggered, a clear signature of the trap network. In young to middle-aged stars like PSR J0537-6910, we expect quakes which result in new traps and also unpin the vortices in existing ones. We observe that such a configuration involving the simultaneous release of several traps could introduce a bimodality in the glitch-size distribution, a feature that has previously been reported for PSR J0537-6910. Our simulations also indicate that macroscopic inhomogeneities in the distribution of vortices could spontaneously develop in a star with uniform pinning sites.

astro-ph.HE

Can We Find the Emission Mechanism Behind the Extremely Bright GRB 230812B?

GRB 230812B is a bright long-duration GRB with a luminous, long-lived afterglow and an AstroSat/CZTI polarization measurement during the prompt phase, enabling a joint study of its prompt spectral evolution, polarization, and broadband afterglow. Time-resolved spectroscopy of the prompt emission shows that during the rising phase, the low-energy Band-function index exceeds the synchrotron line of death, favoring the presence of an additional thermal component. At later times, from $T_0+2$ s to $T_0+32$ s, the prompt spectra are consistent with predominantly non-thermal emission. Polarization analysis of the prompt emission in the $300$-$600$ keV band yields a marginal lower limit on the polarization fraction of $Π\gtrsim 50\%$ at the $1σ$ level. The long X-ray monitoring of the afterglow shows no jet break over the observed baseline. Multiwavelength afterglow modeling favors a wide jet with an inferred half-opening angle of $θ_j = 15^{+6}_{-4}$ degrees observed close to the jet axis with a viewing angle of $θ_v = 0.9^{+1.8}_{-0.6}$ degrees. The inferred circumburst density is low, $n_0 = 1.2^{+0.3}_{-0.1}\times10^{-4}\,\textrm{cm}^{-3}$, and the isotropic-equivalent kinetic energy of the jet is $E_{{\rm k}, iso} = 4.0^{+1.5}_{-0.8} \times 10^{53}$ erg. Taken together, the prompt spectral evolution favors an early phase with a thermal contribution followed by a later phase dominated by non-thermal emission. The polarization constraint in the late prompt phase is consistent with synchrotron emission, although a higher-significance polarization measurement will be required to robustly constrain the magnetic-field geometry and the relative contribution of photospheric emission.

astro-ph.HE

RTFF: Random-to-Target Fabric Flattening Policy using Dual-Arm Manipulator

Robotic fabric manipulation remains challenging due to fabric deformability and occlusions from wrinkles and the manipulator. This paper defines Random-to-Target Fabric Flattening (RTFF) as the task of bringing a randomly wrinkled fabric to an arbitrary user-specified wrinkle-free target pose. RTFF requires simultaneous flattening and pose alignment, where the two objectives are inherently coupled since flattening the fabric displaces its pose, while realigning it tends to introduce wrinkles. To solve this task, this paper anchors both the current and target fabric states to the same template mesh, enabling direct vertex-level wrinkle and pose assessment without registration. Building on this representation, a hybrid Imitation Learning--Visual Servoing (IL--VS) RTFF policy is proposed. A novel Mesh Action Chunking Transformer (MACT) leverages structured mesh observations to achieve goal-conditioned coarse alignment from a compact demonstration set, after which VS ensures precise convergence to the target. The policy is validated on a real dual-arm teleoperation system, demonstrating precise alignment to unseen target poses, fabric types, and scales. Code and videos: https://kaitang98.github.io/RTFF_Policy/

cs.RO

Episode-wise spectro-polarimetry of GRB 220107A: Testing the hypothesis of evolving radiation mechanisms

We investigate the spectro-polarimetric properties of the long-duration GRB~220107A, which exhibited two distinct emission episodes separated by a 40 s quiescent gap, to test whether such multi-episode bursts show evidence for evolution in their underlying radiation mechanisms. We analyzed prompt emission data from AstroSat/CZTI, Fermi/GBM, and Konus-Wind, performing spectro-polarimetric analysis for each emission episode. The time-integrated polarization analysis shows no significant detection (PF$ < 38 \%$, $2σ$). Time-resolved analysis reveals clear spectral evolution between the two episodes, with episode 1 exhibiting a hard low-energy photon index and episode 2 showing substantial spectral softening ($α\sim -0.72$). Regarding polarization: Episode 1 shows a low polarization upper limit (< 52\%), consistent with expectations for photospheric emission dominated by quasi-thermal Comptonization in a baryon-rich outflow. Episode 2 also shows overall low polarization (PF$ < 55 \%$, $2σ$), though sliding-window analysis yields a marginally elevated signal (PF$= 70 \pm 30\%$, BF = 2.8) between T0+76 to T0+88 s. The robust spectral softening between episodes could arise from sub-photospheric dissipation, optically thin synchrotron radiation in small-scale magnetic fields, or if the tentative polarization enhancement proves intrinsic, it would favor synchrotron emission in large-scale ordered magnetic fields. The spectral evolution of GRB 220107A, combined with our polarimetric constraints, demonstrates the diagnostic potential of time-resolved spectro-polarimetry for constraining GRB prompt emission physics. We present GRB 220107A as a test case illustrating how future higher sensitivity observations could discriminate between competing emission models for multi-episode bursts. Our results emphasize both the promise and current limitations of prompt phase polarimetry.

astro-ph.HE

Time-resolved spectro-polarimetric analysis of extremely bright GRB 230307A: Possible Evidence of evolution from photospheric to synchrotron dominated emission

The radiation mechanisms powering Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) and their physical processes remain one of the unresolved questions in high-energy astrophysics. Spectro-polarimetric observations of exceptionally bright GRBs provide a powerful diagnostic tool to address these challenges. GRB 230307A, the second-brightest long-duration GRB ever detected, exhibits a rare association with a Kilonova, offering a unique and rare probe into the emission processes of GRBs originating from compact object mergers. We present a comprehensive time-averaged and time-resolved spectro-polarimetric analysis of GRB 230307A using joint observations from the $AstroSat$ Cadmium Zinc Telluride Imager (CZTI), the $Fermi$ Gamma-ray Burst Monitor (GBM) and $Konus$-Wind. Spectral analysis reveals a temporal evolution in the low-energy photon index, $α$, transitioning from a hard to a softer state over the burst duration. Time-averaged polarimetric measurements yield a low polarization fraction ($<$ 12.7 %), whereas time-resolved polarization analysis unveils a marked increase in polarization fractions ($>$ 49 %) in the later stages of the emission episode. This spectro-polarimetric evolution suggests a transition in the dominant radiative mechanism: the initial phase, possibly characterized by thermal-dominated photospheric emission (unpolarized or weakly polarized), gives way to a regime dominated by non-thermal synchrotron emission (highly polarized). This transition provides possible evidence for the evolving influence of magnetic fields in shaping the GRB emission process and jet dynamics.

astro-ph.HE

Spectro-polarimetry of GRB 180427A: evidence for distinct emission sites with varying polarisation

The dynamics of the origin of gamma-ray emissions in gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) remains an enigma. Through a joint analysis of GRB 180427A, observed by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and AstroSat's Cadmium Zinc Telluride Imager, we identify emissions from two distinct regions with varying polarisation properties. Time-resolved polarisation analysis reveals a synchronous evolution of the polarisation angle (PA) and fraction (PF) with two emission pulses, peaking with a delay of $ 5.09 \pm 0.29\, \mathrm{s}$. Spectral analysis indicates that the first pulse is characterised by a stronger blackbody component, while the second pulse exhibits a more prominent non-thermal spectrum (power law with an exponential cutoff). Using a bottom-to-top approach through simulations, we decouple the polarisation properties of the individual spectral components, revealing polarisation fractions of 25\% - 40\% for the blackbody spectrum and 30\% - 60\% for the non-thermal spectrum. At a redshift of $z \sim 0.22$, the blackbody emission originates from the jet photosphere at $\sim$ a few $10^{11}\, \mathrm{cm}$, whereas the non-thermal emission arises from an optically thin region at a few $10^{13}\, \mathrm{cm}$. The changing dominance of these emissions explains the observed PA shift of $60^\circ \pm 22^\circ$. The spectral cutoff at 1 MeV suggests pair opacity due to the jet's relatively lower bulk Lorentz factor ($Γ\sim$ a few tens). The high polarisation fraction and hard low energy spectral slopes ($α> -0.5$) imply a top-hat jet structure observed off-axis, near the jet's edge. This off-axis viewing introduces anisotropy in the observed radiation within the viewing cone ($1/Γ$), accounting for the observed polarisation.

astro-ph.HE

A White Paper on The Multi-Messenger Science Landscape in India

The multi-messenger science using different observational windows to the Universe such as Gravitational Waves (GWs), Electromagnetic Waves (EMs), Cosmic Rays (CRs), and Neutrinos offer an opportunity to study from the scale of a neutron star to cosmological scales over a large cosmic time. At the smallest scales, we can explore the structure of the neutron star and the different energetics involved in the transition of a pre-merger neutron star to a post-merger neutron star. This will open up a window to study the properties of matter in extreme conditions and a guaranteed discovery space. On the other hand, at the largest cosmological scales, multi-messenger observations allow us to study the long-standing problems in physical cosmology related to the Hubble constant, dark matter, and dark energy by mapping the expansion history of the Universe using GW sources. Moreover, the multi-messenger studies of astrophysical systems such as white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes of different masses, all the way up to a high redshift Universe, will bring insightful understanding into the physical processes associated with them that are inaccessible otherwise. This white paper discusses the key cases in the domain of multi-messenger astronomy and the role of observatories in India which can explore uncharted territories and open discovery spaces in different branches of physics ranging from nuclear physics to astrophysics.

astro-ph.HE

Astrophysics with Compact Objects: An Indian Perspective, Present Status and Future Vision

Astrophysical compact objects, viz., white dwarfs, neutron stars, and black holes, are the remnants of stellar deaths at the end of their life cycles. They are ideal testbeds for various fundamental physical processes under extreme conditions that are unique in nature. Observational radio astronomy with uGMRT and OORT facilities has led to several important breakthroughs in studies of different kinds of pulsars and their emission mechanisms. On the other hand, accretion processes around compact objects are at the core of Indian astronomy research. In this context, AstroSat mission revolutionized spectro-temporal observations and measurements of accretion phenomena, quasi-periodic oscillations, and jet behaviour in binary systems hosting compact objects. Moreover, recently launched XPoSat mission is set to provide an impetus to these high-energy phenomena around compact objects by enabling us to conduct polarization measurements in the X-ray band. Further, during the past decade, numerous gravitational wave signals have been observed from coalescing black holes and neutron stars in binary systems. Recent simultaneous observation of the GW170817 event in both gravitational waves and electromagnetic channels has ushered in the era of multi-messenger astronomy. In the future, synergistic efforts among several world-class observational facilities, e.g., LIGO-India, SKA, TMT, etc., within the Indian astrophysics community will provide a significant boost to achieve several key science goals that have been delineated here. In general, this article plans to highlight scientific projects being pursued across Indian institutions in this field, the scientific challenges that this community would be focusing on, and the opportunities in the coming decade. Finally, we have also mentioned the required resources, both in the form of infrastructural and human resources.

astro-ph.HE

On Bactrian glitch-size distributions

A glitch is a rare and sudden increase in the otherwise steadily decreasing rotation rate of a pulsar. Its cause is widely attributed to the transfer of angular momentum to the crust of the star from the array of superfluid vortices enclosed within. The magnitude of such an increase defines the size of the glitch. The distribution of glitch sizes in individual pulsars, the power-law being the most argued for, is shrouded in uncertainty due to the small sample size. From a Bayesian perspective, we revisit the data for PSR J0537-6910, the pulsar with the most glitches, and find a bimodality in the distribution, reminiscent of the Bactrian camel. To understand this bimodality, we use a superfluid vortex simulator and study three independent neutron star paradigms: (i) Annular variation in pinning strength to account for the predicted differences between the crust and the core; (ii) Sectorial triggers to mimic local disturbances; and (iii) Stress-waves to model global disturbances. We find that annular variation in pinning introduces a bimodality in the glitch-size distribution and that sectorial triggers do so weakly. Stress-waves do not lead to any such features for the range of parameters tested. This provides us with new insights into the effects of various perturbations on the vortex dynamics and the glitch statistics of neutron stars.

astro-ph.HE

Investigating Polarization characteristics of GRB200503A and GRB201009A

We present results of a comprehensive analysis of the polarization characteristics of GRB 200503A and GRB 201009A observed with the Cadmium Zinc Telluride Imager (CZTI) on board AstroSat. Despite these GRBs being reasonably bright, they were missed by several spacecraft and had thus far not been localized well, hindering polarization analysis. We present positions of these bursts obtained from the Inter-Planetary Network (IPN) and the newly developed CZTI localization pipeline. We then undertook polarization analyses using the standard CZTI pipeline. We cannot constrain the polarization properties for GRB 200503A, but find that GRB 201009A has a high degree of polarization.

astro-ph.HE

Accretion Geometry of GX 339-4 in the Hard State: AstroSat View

We perform broadband ($0.7-100$ keV) spectral analysis of five hard state observations of the low-mass back hole X-ray binary GX~339--4 taken by AstroSat during the rising phase of three outbursts from $2019$ to $2022$. We find that the outburst in 2021 was the only successful/full outburst, while the source was unable to make transition to the soft state during the other two outbursts in 2019 and 2022. Our spectral analysis employs two different model combinations, requiring two separate Comptonizing regions and their associated reflection components, and soft X-ray excess emission. The harder Comptonizing component dominates the overall bolometric luminosity, while the softer one remains relatively weak. Our spectral fits indicate that the disk evolves with the source luminosity, where the inner disk radius decreases with increasing luminosity. However, the disk remains substantially truncated throughout all the observations at the source luminosity of $\sim2-8\%\times$ of the Eddington luminosity. We note that our assumption of the soft X-ray excess emission as disk blackbody may not be realistic, and this kind of soft excess may arise due the non-homogeneity in the disk/corona geometry. Our temporal analysis deriving the power density spectra suggests that the break frequency increases with the source luminosity. Furthermore, our analysis demonstrates a consistency between the inner disk radii estimated from break frequency of the power density spectra and those obtained from the reflection modelling, supporting the truncated disk geometry in the hard state.

astro-ph.HE

Detection of simultaneous QPO triplets in 4U 1728-34 and constraining the neutron star mass and moment of inertia

We report simultaneous detection of twin kHz and $\sim 40$ Hz quasi-periodic oscillations (QPOs) in the time-resolved analysis of the AstroSat/LAXPC observation of the neutron star low mass X-ray binary, 4U 1728-34. The frequencies of the multiple sets of triplets are correlated with each other and are consistent with their identification as the orbital, periastron and twice the nodal precessions frequencies. The observed relations, along with the known spin of the neutron star, put constraints on the mass and the ratio of moment of inertia to the mass of the neutron star to be $M^*_\odot = 1.92\pm 0.01$ and $I_{45}/M^*_\odot = 1.07\pm 0.01$ under the simplistic assumption that the metric is a Kerr one. We crudely estimate that the mass and moment of inertia values obtained may differ by about 1 % and 5 %, respectively, if a self-consistent metric is invoked. Using the TOV equations for computing the moment of inertia of a neutron star in slow rotation approximation, having different equations of state, we find that the predicted values of neutron star parameters favor stiffer equations of state. We expect more stringent constraints would be obtained using a more detailed treatment, where the EOS-dependent metric is used to compute the expected frequencies rather than the Kerr metric used here. The results provide insight into both the nature of these QPOs and the neutron star interior.

astro-ph.HE

A multi-wavelength study of the hard and soft states of MAXI J1820+070 during its 2018 outburst

We present a comprehensive multi-wavelength spectral analysis of the black hole X-ray binary MAXI J1820+070 during its 2018 outburst, utilizing AstroSat far UV, soft and hard X-ray data, along with (quasi-)simultaneous optical and X-ray data from Las Cumbres Observatory and NICER, respectively. In the soft state, we detect soft X-ray and UV/optical excess components over and above the intrinsic accretion disk emission ($kT_{\rm in}\sim 0.58$ keV) and a steep X-ray power-law component. The soft X-ray excess is consistent with a high-temperature blackbody ($kT\sim 0.79$ keV), while the UV/optical excess is described by UV emission lines and two low-temperature blackbody components ($kT\sim 3.87$ eV and $\sim 0.75$ eV). Employing continuum spectral fitting, we determine the black hole spin parameter ($a=0.77\pm0.21$), using the jet inclination angle of $64^{\circ}\pm5^{\circ}$ and a mass spanning $5-10M_{\odot}$. In the hard state, we observe a significantly enhanced optical/UV excess component, indicating a stronger reprocessed emission in the outer disk. Broad-band X-ray spectroscopy in the hard state reveals a two-component corona, each associated with its reflection component, in addition to the disk emission ($kT_{\rm in}\sim 0.19$ keV). The softer coronal component dominates the bolometric X-ray luminosity and produces broader relativistic reflection features, while the harder component gets reflected far from the inner disk, yielding narrow reflection features. Furthermore, our analysis in the hard state suggests a substantial truncation of the inner disk ($\gtrsim 51$ gravitational radii) and a high disk density ($\sim 10^{20}\ \rm cm^{-3}$).

astro-ph.HE