arXiv subjects

R Venkatesha Prasad

Publications and source records attributed to R Venkatesha Prasad.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2022

Covy: An AI-powered Robot with a Compound Vision System for Detecting Breaches in Social Distancing

This paper introduces a compound vision system that enables robots to localize people up to 15m away using a cheap camera. And, it proposes a robust navigation stack that combines Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) and a probabilistic localization method. To test the efficacy of these systems, we prototyped a low-cost mobile robot that we call Covy. Covy can be used for applications such as promoting social distancing during pandemics or estimating the density of a crowd. We evaluated Covy's performance through extensive sets of experiments both in simulated and realistic environments. Our results show that Covy's compound vision algorithm doubles the range of the used depth camera, and its hybrid navigation stack is more robust than a pure DRL-based one.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2021

Deep Reinforcement Learning Versus Evolution Strategies: A Comparative Survey

Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) and Evolution Strategies (ESs) have surpassed human-level control in many sequential decision-making problems, yet many open challenges still exist. To get insights into the strengths and weaknesses of DRL versus ESs, an analysis of their respective capabilities and limitations is provided. After presenting their fundamental concepts and algorithms, a comparison is provided on key aspects such as scalability, exploration, adaptation to dynamic environments, and multi-agent learning. Then, the benefits of hybrid algorithms that combine concepts from DRL and ESs are highlighted. Finally, to have an indication about how they compare in real-world applications, a survey of the literature for the set of applications they support is provided.

cs.LG↗

arXiv2021

Energy Efficient Data Recovery from Corrupted LoRa Frames

High frame-corruption is widely observed in Long Range Wide Area Networks (LoRaWAN) due to the coexistence with other networks in ISM bands and an Aloha-like MAC layer. LoRa's Forward Error Correction (FEC) mechanism is often insufficient to retrieve corrupted data. In fact, real-life measurements show that at least one-fourth of received transmissions are corrupted. When more frames are dropped, LoRa nodes usually switch over to higher spreading factors (SF), thus increasing transmission times and increasing the required energy. This paper introduces ReDCoS, a novel coding technique at the application layer that improves recovery of corrupted LoRa frames, thus reducing the overall transmission time and energy invested by LoRa nodes by several-fold. ReDCoS utilizes lightweight coding techniques to pre-encode the transmitted data. Therefore, the inbuilt Cyclic Redundancy Check (CRC) that follows is computed based on an already encoded data. At the receiver, we use both the CRC and the coded data to recover data from a corrupted frame beyond the built-in Error Correcting Code (ECC). We compare the performance of ReDCoS to (I) the standard FEC of vanilla-LoRaWAN, and to (ii) RS coding applied as ECC to the data of LoRaWAN. The results indicated a 54x and 13.5x improvement of decoding ratio, respectively, when 20 data symbols were sent. Furthermore, we evaluated ReDCoS on-field using LoRa SX1261 transceivers showing that it outperformed RS-coding by factor of at least 2x (and up to 6x) in terms of the decoding ratio while consuming 38.5% less energy per correctly received transmission.

cs.IT↗

arXiv2014

Zero Energy Network stack for Energy Harvested WSNs

We present our ``Zero Energy Network'' (ZEN) protocol stack for energy harvesting wireless sensor networks applications. The novelty in our work is $4$ fold: (1) Energy harvesting aware fully featured MAC layer. Carrier sensing, Backoff algorithms, ARQ, RTS/CTS mechanisms, Adaptive Duty Cycling are either auto configurable or available as tunable parameters to match the available energy (b) Energy harvesting aware Routing Protocol. The multi-hop network establishes routes to the base station using a modified version of AODVjr routing protocol assisted by energy predictions. (c) Application of a time series called ``Holt-Winters'' for predicting the incoming energy. (d) A distributed smart application running over the ZEN stack which utilizes a multi parameter optimized perturbation technique to optimally use the available energy. The application is capable of programming the ZEN stack in an energy efficient manner. The energy harvested distributed smart application runs on a realistic solar energy trace with a three year seasonality database. We implement a smart application, capable of modifying itself to suit its own as well as the network's energy level. Our analytical results show a close match with the measurements conducted over EHWSN testbed.

cs.NI↗