Task planning and action coordination in integrated sensor-based robots

AbstructIntelligent robots interact with the real world by employing their advanced sensory mechanisms to perceive their environment, and using their effectors and tools to change the state of their environment. Some of the important capabilities which endow “intelligence” to those robots include, (1) planning, i.e., given a goal, the ability to generate a set of task plans which will lead to achieving the goal, (2) coordination and execution of the perceptual actions, i.e., the abilities to coordinate sensors, acquire sensory data, and process, interpret and transform the sensory information, and (3) coordination and execution of the motor actions, i.e., the ability to navigate in their environments and the ability to coordinate effectors and tools and manipulate objects to accomplish assigned tasks. In this paper we introduce a System Architecture for Sensor-based Intelligent Robots (SASIR). The system architecture consists of Percept ion, Motor, Task Planner, Knowledge-Base, User Interface and Supervisor modules. SASIR is constructed using a frame data structure, which provides a suitable and flexible scheme for representation and manipulation of the world model, the sensor derived information, as well as for describing the actions required for the execution of a specific task. The experimental results show the basic validity of the general architecture as well as the robust and successful performance of two working systems: (1) the Autonomous Spill Cleaning (ASC) Robotic System, and (2), ROBOSIGHT, which is capable of a range of autonomous inspection and manipulation tasks. Simulation and animation techniques were employed, in addition to the real-world testing, during the system development. The system components were successfully transported to another research laboratory involving a different type of robot, different sensors, and a different physical environment.