arXiv subjects

Kai Goebel

Publications and source records attributed to Kai Goebel.

9 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Build on Priors: Vision--Language--Guided Neuro-Symbolic Imitation Learning for Data-Efficient Real-World Robot Manipulation

Enabling robots to learn long-horizon manipulation tasks from a handful of demonstrations remains a central challenge in robotics. Existing neuro-symbolic approaches often rely on hand-crafted symbolic abstractions, semantically labeled trajectories or large demonstration datasets, limiting their scalability and real-world applicability. We present a scalable neuro-symbolic framework that autonomously constructs symbolic planning domains and data-efficient control policies from as few as one to thirty unannotated skill demonstrations, without requiring manual domain engineering. Our method segments demonstrations into skills and employs a Vision-Language Model (VLM) to classify skills and identify equivalent high-level states, enabling automatic construction of a state-transition graph. This graph is processed by an Answer Set Programming solver to synthesize a PDDL planning domain, which an oracle function exploits to isolate the minimal, task-relevant and target relative observation and action spaces for each skill policy. Policies are learned at the control reference level rather than at the raw actuator signal level, yielding a smoother and less noisy learning target. Known controllers can be leveraged for real-world data augmentation by projecting a single demonstration onto other objects in the scene, simultaneously enriching the graph construction process and the dataset for imitation learning. We validate our framework primarily on a real industrial forklift across statistically rigorous manipulation trials, and demonstrate cross-platform generality on a Kinova Gen3 robotic arm across two standard benchmarks. Our results show that grounding control learning, VLM-driven abstraction, and automated planning synthesis into a unified pipeline constitutes a practical path toward scalable, data-efficient, expert-free and interpretable neuro-symbolic robotics.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2025

Can LLM-Reasoning Models Replace Classical Planning? A Benchmark Study

Recent advancements in Large Language Models have sparked interest in their potential for robotic task planning. While these models demonstrate strong generative capabilities, their effectiveness in producing structured and executable plans remains uncertain. This paper presents a systematic evaluation of a broad spectrum of current state of the art language models, each directly prompted using Planning Domain Definition Language domain and problem files, and compares their planning performance with the Fast Downward planner across a variety of benchmarks. In addition to measuring success rates, we assess how faithfully the generated plans translate into sequences of actions that can actually be executed, identifying both strengths and limitations of using these models in this setting. Our findings show that while the models perform well on simpler planning tasks, they continue to struggle with more complex scenarios that require precise resource management, consistent state tracking, and strict constraint compliance. These results underscore fundamental challenges in applying language models to robotic planning in real world environments. By outlining the gaps that emerge during execution, we aim to guide future research toward combined approaches that integrate language models with classical planners in order to enhance the reliability and scalability of planning in autonomous robotics.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2024

Health Index Estimation Through Integration of General Knowledge with Unsupervised Learning

Accurately estimating a Health Index (HI) from condition monitoring data (CM) is essential for reliable and interpretable prognostics and health management (PHM) in complex systems. In most scenarios, complex systems operate under varying operating conditions and can exhibit different fault modes, making unsupervised inference of an HI from CM data a significant challenge. Hybrid models combining prior knowledge about degradation with deep learning models have been proposed to overcome this challenge. However, previously suggested hybrid models for HI estimation usually rely heavily on system-specific information, limiting their transferability to other systems. In this work, we propose an unsupervised hybrid method for HI estimation that integrates general knowledge about degradation into the convolutional autoencoder's model architecture and learning algorithm, enhancing its applicability across various systems. The effectiveness of the proposed method is demonstrated in two case studies from different domains: turbofan engines and lithium batteries. The results show that the proposed method outperforms other competitive alternatives, including residual-based methods, in terms of HI quality and their utility for Remaining Useful Life (RUL) predictions. The case studies also highlight the comparable performance of our proposed method with a supervised model trained with HI labels.

cs.LG↗

arXiv2024

Monitoring-Supported Value Generation for Managing Structures and Infrastructure Systems

To maximize its value, the design, development and implementation of Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) should focus on its role in facilitating decision support. In this position paper, we offer perspectives on the synergy between SHM and decision-making. We propose a classification of SHM use cases aligning with various dimensions that are closely linked to the respective decision contexts. The types of decisions that have to be supported by the SHM system within these settings are discussed along with the corresponding challenges. We provide an overview of different classes of models that are required for integrating SHM in the decision-making process to support management and operation and maintenance of structures and infrastructure systems. Fundamental decision-theoretic principles and state-of-the-art methods for optimizing maintenance and operational decision-making under uncertainty are briefly discussed. Finally, we offer a viewpoint on the appropriate course of action for quantifying, validating and maximizing the added value generated by SHM. This work aspires to synthesize the different perspectives of the SHM, Prognostic Health Management (PHM), and reliability communities, and deliver a roadmap towards monitoring-based decision support.

cs.CY↗

arXiv2023

A metric for assessing and optimizing data-driven prognostic algorithms for predictive maintenance

Prognostic Health Management aims to predict the Remaining Useful Life (RUL) of degrading components/systems utilizing monitoring data. These RUL predictions form the basis for optimizing maintenance planning in a Predictive Maintenance (PdM) paradigm. We here propose a metric for assessing data-driven prognostic algorithms based on their impact on downstream PdM decisions. The metric is defined in association with a decision setting and a corresponding PdM policy. We consider two typical PdM decision settings, namely component ordering and/or replacement planning, for which we investigate and improve PdM policies that are commonly utilized in the literature. All policies are evaluated via the data-based estimation of the long-run expected maintenance cost per unit time, using monitored run-to-failure experiments. The policy evaluation enables the estimation of the proposed metric. We employ the metric as an objective function for optimizing heuristic PdM policies and algorithms' hyperparameters. The effect of different PdM policies on the metric is initially investigated through a theoretical numerical example. Subsequently, we employ four data-driven prognostic algorithms on a simulated turbofan engine degradation problem, and investigate the joint effect of prognostic algorithm and PdM policy on the metric, resulting in a decision-oriented performance assessment of these algorithms.

stat.AP↗

arXiv2020

Fusing Physics-based and Deep Learning Models for Prognostics

Physics-based and data-driven models for remaining useful lifetime (RUL) prediction typically suffer from two major challenges that limit their applicability to complex real-world domains: (1) incompleteness of physics-based models and (2) limited representativeness of the training dataset for data-driven models. Combining the advantages of these two directions while overcoming some of their limitations, we propose a novel hybrid framework for fusing the information from physics-based performance models with deep learning algorithms for prognostics of complex safety-critical systems under real-world scenarios. In the proposed framework, we use physics-based performance models to infer unobservable model parameters related to a system's components health solving a calibration problem. These parameters are subsequently combined with sensor readings and used as input to a deep neural network to generate a data-driven prognostics model with physics-augmented features. The performance of the hybrid framework is evaluated on an extensive case study comprising run-to-failure degradation trajectories from a fleet of nine turbofan engines under real flight conditions. The experimental results show that the hybrid framework outperforms purely data-driven approaches by extending the prediction horizon by nearly 127\%. Furthermore, it requires less training data and is less sensitive to the limited representativeness of the dataset compared to purely data-driven approaches.

eess.SY↗

arXiv2020

Real-Time Model Calibration with Deep Reinforcement Learning

The dynamic, real-time, and accurate inference of model parameters from empirical data is of great importance in many scientific and engineering disciplines that use computational models (such as a digital twin) for the analysis and prediction of complex physical processes. However, fast and accurate inference for processes with large and high dimensional datasets cannot easily be achieved with state-of-the-art methods under noisy real-world conditions. The primary reason is that the inference of model parameters with traditional techniques based on optimisation or sampling often suffers from computational and statistical challenges, resulting in a trade-off between accuracy and deployment time. In this paper, we propose a novel framework for inference of model parameters based on reinforcement learning. The contribution of the paper is twofold: 1) We reformulate the inference problem as a tracking problem with the objective of learning a policy that forces the response of the physics-based model to follow the observations; 2) We propose the constrained Lyapunov-based actor-critic (CLAC) algorithm to enable the robust and accurate inference of physics-based model parameters in real time under noisy real-world conditions. The proposed methodology is demonstrated and evaluated on two model-based diagnostics test cases utilizing two different physics-based models of turbofan engines. The performance of the methodology is compared to that of two alternative approaches: a state update method (unscented Kalman filter) and a supervised end-to-end mapping with deep neural networks. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed methodology outperforms all other tested methods in terms of speed and robustness, with high inference accuracy.

eess.SP↗

arXiv2019

Hybrid deep fault detection and isolation: Combining deep neural networks and system performance models

With the increased availability of condition monitoring data and the increased complexity of explicit system physics-based models, the application of data-driven approaches for fault detection and isolation has recently grown. While detection accuracy of such approaches is generally good, their performance on fault isolation often suffers from the fact that fault conditions affect a large portion of the measured signals thereby masking the fault source. To overcome this limitation and enable a more accurate fault detection, we propose a hybrid approach combining physical performance models with deep learning algorithms. Unobserved process variables are inferred with a physics-based performance model to enhance the input space of a data-driven diagnostics model. To validate the effectiveness of the proposed method, we generate a condition monitoring dataset of an advanced gas turbine during flight conditions under healthy and four faulty operative conditions based on the Commercial Modular Aero-Propulsion System Simulation (C-MAPSS) dynamical model. We evaluate the performance of the proposed method in combination with two different deep learning algorithms: feed forward neural networks and Variational Autoencoders, both of which demonstrate a significant improvement when applied within the hybrid fault detection and diagnostics framework. The proposed method is able to outperform pure data-driven solutions, particularly for systems with a high variability of operating conditions. It provides superior results both for fault detection as well as for fault isolation. For fault isolation, it overcomes the smearing effect that is observed in pure data-driven approaches and enables a precise isolation of the affected signal. We also demonstrate that deep learning algorithms provide a better performance on fault detection compared to the traditional machine learning algorithms.

eess.SY↗

arXiv2019

Parameters inference and model reduction for the Single-Particle Model of Li ion cells

The Single-Particle Model (SPM) of Li ion cell \cite{Santhanagopalan06, Guo2011} is a computationally efficient and fairly accurate model for simulating Li ion cell cycling behavior at weak to moderate currents. The model depends on a large number of parameters describing the geometry and material properties of a cell components. In order to use the SPM for simulation of a 18650 LP battery cycling behavior, we fitted the values of the model parameters to a cycling data. We found that the distribution of parametric values for which the SPM fits the data accurately is strongly delocalized in the (nondimensionalized) parametric space, with variances in certain directions larger by many orders of magnitude than in other directions. This property of the SPM is known to be shared by a multitude of the so-called "sloppy models" \cite{Brown2003, Waterfall2006}, characterized by a few stiff directions in the parametric space, in which the predicted behavior varies significantly, and a number of sloppy directions in which the behavior doesn't change appreciably. As a consequence, only stiff parameters of the SPM can be inferred with a fair degree of certainty and these are the parameters which determine the cycling behavior of the battery. Based on geometrical insights from the Sloppy Models theory, we derive an hierarchy of reduced models for the SPM. The fully reduced model depends on only three stiff effective parameters which can be used for the battery state of health characterization.

physics.comp-ph↗