Huaping Liu

Although sensor fusion is an essential prerequisite for autonomous driving, it entails a number of challenges and potential risks. For example, the commonly used deep fusion networks are lacking in interpretability and robustness. To address these fundamental issues, this book introduces the mechanism of deep fusion models from the perspective of uncertainty and models the initial risks in order to create a robust fusion architecture. This book reviews the multi-sensor data fusion methods applied in autonomous driving, and the main body is divided into three parts: Basic, Method, and Advance. Starting from the mechanism of data fusion, it comprehensively reviews the development of automatic perception technology and data fusion technology, and gives a comprehensive overview of various perception tasks based on multimodal data fusion. The book then proposes a series of innovative algorithms for various autonomous driving perception tasks, to effectively improve the accuracy and robustness of autonomous driving-related tasks, and provide ideas for solving the challenges in multi-sensor fusion methods. Furthermore, to transition from technical research to intelligent connected collaboration applications, it proposes a series of exploratory contents such as practical fusion datasets, vehicle-road collaboration, and fusion mechanisms. In contrast to the existing literature on data fusion and autonomous driving, this book focuses more on the deep fusion method for perception-related tasks, emphasizes the theoretical explanation of the fusion method, and fully considers the relevant scenarios in engineering practice. Helping readers acquire an in-depth understanding of fusion methods and theories in autonomous driving, it can be used as a textbook for graduate students and scholars in related fields or as a reference guide for engineers who wish to apply deep fusion methods.

Over the next few decades, millions of people, with varying backgrounds and levels of technical expertise, will have to effectively interact with robotic technologies on a daily basis. This means it will have to be possible to modify robot behavior without explicitly writing code, but instead via a small number of wearable devices or visual demonstrations. At the same time, robots will need to infer and predict humans’ intentions and internal objectives on the basis of past interactions in order to provide assistance before it is explicitly requested; this is the basis of imitation learning for robotics. This book introduces readers to robotic imitation learning based on human demonstration with wearable devices. It presents an advanced calibration method for wearable sensors and fusion approaches under the Kalman filter framework, as well as a novel wearable device for capturing gestures and other motions. Furthermore it describes the wearable-device-based and vision-based imitation learning method for robotic manipulation, making it a valuable reference guide for graduate students with a basic knowledge of machine learning, and for researchers interested in wearable computing and robotic learning.

Over the next few decades, millions of people, with varying backgrounds and levels of technical expertise, will have to effectively interact with robotic technologies on a daily basis. This means it will have to be possible to modify robot behavior without explicitly writing code, but instead via a small number of wearable devices or visual demonstrations. At the same time, robots will need to infer and predict humans’ intentions and internal objectives on the basis of past interactions in order to provide assistance before it is explicitly requested; this is the basis of imitation learning for robotics. This book introduces readers to robotic imitation learning based on human demonstration with wearable devices. It presents an advanced calibration method for wearable sensors and fusion approaches under the Kalman filter framework, as well as a novel wearable device for capturing gestures and other motions. Furthermore it describes the wearable-device-based and vision-based imitation learning method for robotic manipulation, making it a valuable reference guide for graduate students with a basic knowledge of machine learning, and for researchers interested in wearable computing and robotic learning.

In recent years, embodied multi-agent systems, including multi-robots, have emerged as essential solution for demanding tasks such as search and rescue, environmental monitoring, and space exploration. Effective collaboration among these agents is crucial but presents significant challenges due to differences in morphology and capabilities, especially in heterogenous systems. While existing books address collaboration control, perception, and learning, there is a gap in focusing on active perception and interactive learning for embodied multi-agent systems. This book aims to bridge this gap by establishing a unified framework for perception and learning in embodied multi-agent systems. It presents and discusses the perception-action-learning loop, offering systematic solutions for various types of agents—homogeneous, heterogeneous, and ad hoc. Beyond the popular reinforcement learning techniques, the book provides insights into using fundamental models to tackle complex collaboration problems. By interchangeably utilizing constrained optimization, reinforcement learning, and fundamental models, this book offers a comprehensive toolkit for solving different types of embodied multi-agent problems. Readers will gain an understanding of the advantages and disadvantages of each method for various tasks. This book will be particularly valuable to graduate students and professional researchers in robotics and machine learning. It provides a robust learning framework for addressing practical challenges in embodied multi-agent systems and demonstrates the promising potential of fundamental models for scenario generation, policy learning, and planning in complex collaboration problems.

Although sensor fusion is an essential prerequisite for autonomous driving, it entails a number of challenges and potential risks. For example, the commonly used deep fusion networks are lacking in interpretability and robustness. To address these fundamental issues, this book introduces the mechanism of deep fusion models from the perspective of uncertainty and models the initial risks in order to create a robust fusion architecture. This book reviews the multi-sensor data fusion methods applied in autonomous driving, and the main body is divided into three parts: Basic, Method, and Advance. Starting from the mechanism of data fusion, it comprehensively reviews the development of automatic perception technology and data fusion technology, and gives a comprehensive overview of various perception tasks based on multimodal data fusion. The book then proposes a series of innovative algorithms for various autonomous driving perception tasks, to effectively improve the accuracy and robustness of autonomous driving-related tasks, and provide ideas for solving the challenges in multi-sensor fusion methods. Furthermore, to transition from technical research to intelligent connected collaboration applications, it proposes a series of exploratory contents such as practical fusion datasets, vehicle-road collaboration, and fusion mechanisms. In contrast to the existing literature on data fusion and autonomous driving, this book focuses more on the deep fusion method for perception-related tasks, emphasizes the theoretical explanation of the fusion method, and fully considers the relevant scenarios in engineering practice. Helping readers acquire an in-depth understanding of fusion methods and theories in autonomous driving, it can be used as a textbook for graduate students and scholars in related fields or as a reference guide for engineers who wish to apply deep fusion methods.

This book introduces the challenges of robotic tactile perception and task understanding, and describes an advanced approach based on machine learning and sparse coding techniques. Further, a set of structured sparse coding models is developed to address the issues of dynamic tactile sensing. The book then proves that the proposed framework is effective in solving the problems of multi-finger tactile object recognition, multi-label tactile adjective recognition and multi-category material analysis, which are all challenging practical problems in the fields of robotics and automation. The proposed sparse coding model can be used to tackle the challenging visual-tactile fusion recognition problem, and the book develops a series of efficient optimization algorithms to implement the model. It is suitable as a reference book for graduate students with a basic knowledge of machine learning as well as professional researchers interested in robotic tactile perception and understanding, andmachine learning.

This book introduces the challenges of robotic tactile perception and task understanding, and describes an advanced approach based on machine learning and sparse coding techniques. Further, a set of structured sparse coding models is developed to address the issues of dynamic tactile sensing. The book then proves that the proposed framework is effective in solving the problems of multi-finger tactile object recognition, multi-label tactile adjective recognition and multi-category material analysis, which are all challenging practical problems in the fields of robotics and automation. The proposed sparse coding model can be used to tackle the challenging visual-tactile fusion recognition problem, and the book develops a series of efficient optimization algorithms to implement the model. It is suitable as a reference book for graduate students with a basic knowledge of machine learning as well as professional researchers interested in robotic tactile perception and understanding, andmachine learning.

Designed to help teach and understand communication systems using a classroom-tested, active learning approach. Discusses communication concepts and algorithms, which are explained using simulation projects, accompanied by MATLAB and SimulinkProvides step-by-step code exercises and instructions to implement execution sequencesIncludes a companion website that has MATLAB and Simulink model samples and templates (password: matlab)