MAE 4180 - Autonomous Mobile Robots

(crosslisted) CS 4758, ECE 4180

Spring. 3 credits. Letter grades only.

Prerequisite: MATLAB programming experience. Co-meets with CS 5758/ECE 5772/MAE 5180.

H. Kress-Gazit.

Creating robots capable of performing complex tasks autonomously requires one to address a variety of different challenges such as sensing, perception, control, planning, mechanical design, and interaction with humans. In recent years many advances have been made toward creating such systems, both in the research community (different robot challenges and competitions) and in industry (industrial, military, and domestic robots). This course gives an overview of the challenges and techniques used for creating autonomous mobile robots. Topics include sensing, localization, mapping, path planning, motion planning, obstacle and collision avoidance, and multi-robot control.

Outcome 1: Students will be able to understand and implement localization and mapping algorithms using different sensor modalities.

Outcome 2: Students will be able to generate a path and the motion for a robot moving around an area with obstacles.

Outcome 3: Students will be able to understand and implement the concepts of different approaches for motion planning such as roadmaps, feedback control, and sampling based methods.

Outcome 4: Students will be able to apply the tools learned in the class to physical robots.