arXiv subjects

Swagat Kumar

Publications and source records attributed to Swagat Kumar.

23 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

A Novel Geometry-based Algorithm for Robust Grasping in Extreme Clutter Environment

This paper looks into the problem of grasping unknown objects in a cluttered environment using 3D point cloud data obtained from a range or an RGBD sensor. The objective is to identify graspable regions and detect suitable grasp poses from a single view, possibly, partial 3D point cloud without any apriori knowledge of the object geometry. The problem is solved in two steps: (1) identifying and segmenting various object surfaces and, (2) searching for suitable grasping handles on these surfaces by applying geometric constraints of the physical gripper. The first step is solved by using a modified version of region growing algorithm that uses a pair of thresholds for smoothness constraint on local surface normals to find natural boundaries of object surfaces. In this process, a novel concept of edge point is introduced that allows us to segment between different surfaces of the same object. The second step is solved by converting a 6D pose detection problem into a 1D linear search problem by projecting 3D cloud points onto the principal axes of the object surface. The graspable handles are then localized by applying physical constraints of the gripper. The resulting method allows us to grasp all kinds of objects including rectangular or box-type objects with flat surfaces which have been difficult so far to deal with in the grasping literature. The proposed method is simple and can be implemented in real-time and does not require any off-line training phase for finding these affordances. The improvements achieved is demonstrated through comparison with another state-of-the-art grasping algorithm on various publicly-available and self-created datasets.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2017

Managing a Fleet of Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMR) using Cloud Robotics Platform

In this paper, we provide details of implementing a system for managing a fleet of autonomous mobile robots (AMR) operating in a factory or a warehouse premise. While the robots are themselves autonomous in its motion and obstacle avoidance capability, the target destination for each robot is provided by a global planner. The global planner and the ground vehicles (robots) constitute a multi agent system (MAS) which communicate with each other over a wireless network. Three different approaches are explored for implementation. The first two approaches make use of the distributed computing based Networked Robotics architecture and communication framework of Robot Operating System (ROS) itself while the third approach uses Rapyuta Cloud Robotics framework for this implementation. The comparative performance of these approaches are analyzed through simulation as well as real world experiment with actual robots. These analyses provide an in-depth understanding of the inner working of the Cloud Robotics Platform in contrast to the usual ROS framework. The insight gained through this exercise will be valuable for students as well as practicing engineers interested in implementing similar systems else where. In the process, we also identify few critical limitations of the current Rapyuta platform and provide suggestions to overcome them.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2017

Improving Condition- and Environment-Invariant Place Recognition with Semantic Place Categorization

The place recognition problem comprises two distinct subproblems; recognizing a specific location in the world ("specific" or "ordinary" place recognition) and recognizing the type of place (place categorization). Both are important competencies for mobile robots and have each received significant attention in the robotics and computer vision community, but usually as separate areas of investigation. In this paper, we leverage the powerful complementary nature of place recognition and place categorization processes to create a new hybrid place recognition system that uses place context to inform place recognition. We show that semantic place categorization creates an informative natural segmenting of physical space that in turn enables significantly better place recognition performance in comparison to existing techniques. In particular, this new semantically informed approach adds robustness to significant local changes within the environment, such as transitioning between indoor and outdoor environments or between dark and light rooms in a house, complementing the capabilities of current condition-invariant techniques that are robust to globally consistent change (such as day to night cycles). We perform experiments using 4 benchmark and new datasets and show that semantically-informed place recognition outperforms the previous state-of-the-art systems. Like it does for object recognition [1], we believe that semantics can play a key role in boosting conventional place recognition and navigation performance for robotic systems.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2017

Design and Development of an automated Robotic Pick & Stow System for an e-Commerce Warehouse

In this paper, we provide details of a robotic system that can automate the task of picking and stowing objects from and to a rack in an e-commerce fulfillment warehouse. The system primarily comprises of four main modules: (1) Perception module responsible for recognizing query objects and localizing them in the 3-dimensional robot workspace; (2) Planning module generates necessary paths that the robot end- effector has to take for reaching the objects in the rack or in the tote; (3) Calibration module that defines the physical workspace for the robot visible through the on-board vision system; and (4) Gripping and suction system for picking and stowing different kinds of objects. The perception module uses a faster region-based Convolutional Neural Network (R-CNN) to recognize objects. We designed a novel two finger gripper that incorporates pneumatic valve based suction effect to enhance its ability to pick different kinds of objects. The system was developed by IITK-TCS team for participation in the Amazon Picking Challenge 2016 event. The team secured a fifth place in the stowing task in the event. The purpose of this article is to share our experiences with students and practicing engineers and enable them to build similar systems. The overall efficacy of the system is demonstrated through several simulation as well as real-world experiments with actual robots.

cs.RO↗

arXiv2015

An Occlusion Reasoning Scheme for Monocular Pedestrian Tracking in Dynamic Scenes

This paper looks into the problem of pedestrian tracking using a monocular, potentially moving, uncalibrated camera. The pedestrians are located in each frame using a standard human detector, which are then tracked in subsequent frames. This is a challenging problem as one has to deal with complex situations like changing background, partial or full occlusion and camera motion. In order to carry out successful tracking, it is necessary to resolve associations between the detected windows in the current frame with those obtained from the previous frame. Compared to methods that use temporal windows incorporating past as well as future information, we attempt to make decision on a frame-by-frame basis. An occlusion reasoning scheme is proposed to resolve the association problem between a pair of consecutive frames by using an affinity matrix that defines the closeness between a pair of windows and then, uses a binary integer programming to obtain unique association between them. A second stage of verification based on SURF matching is used to deal with those cases where the above optimization scheme might yield wrong associations. The efficacy of the approach is demonstrated through experiments on several standard pedestrian datasets.

cs.CV↗