Introduction to Robotics and Intelligent Systems (COMP-417)

Syllabus - Fall 2013

 

General Information

Location: Trottier Building 0070
Times: Monday, Wednesday and Friday, 8:35-9:25am.
Instructor: Adjunct Professor Ioannis Rekletis, School of Computer Science.
Office: McConnell 306.
Email: yiannis [at] cim . mcgill . ca
Office hours:   M/W 9:30-10:00, McConnell 306 and by appointment
Teaching assistants:
 
 		 Malika Meghjani
malika [at] cim . mcgill . ca
Office hours: TBA McConnell 403
Class web page:   http://www.cim.mcgill.ca/~yiannis/417/2013

Course Description

At the beginning we will discuss how robots move and interact with their environment. Among other topics we will examine the underlying hardware enabling mobility, kinematics and inverse kinematics, and also the differences between manipulators and mobile robotic systems. Perception of the environment is another fundamental skill for intelligent systems. Sensors, sensor data interpretation, and sensor fusion would be presented next, including recent advances in the field of sensor networks. Reasoning about the environment and the actions a robot takes is the third area we would cover in this course. This would include path planning for mobile robots and configuration spaces for manipulators. The task of mapping, with the underpinning concepts of position estimation and localization, will be explored. We will go over the notion of multi-agent systems, and finally look at applications of robotics in the real world.

The course material would cover the fundamentals of intelligent robotic systems with special focus on the computational aspects. The students would also have the chance to apply some of the theoretical concepts seen in class on a mobile robot (BOEbot) using an existing toolkit.

Course Outline

Week 1: Syllabus presentation, Round Table, Introduction, History of Robotics.
Week 2: Sensor (Tactile, Range Finders, GPS, IMU, Position Encoders).
Week 3: Mapping: Metric Maps, Topological Maps, hybrids
Week 4: Sensor (Vision).
Week 5: Visibility Graphs, Bug Algorithm, Potential Fields.
Week 6: Generalized Voronoi Graphs, Atlas.
Week 7: Actuators. Locomotion. Manipulators.
Week 8: Mid-Term. Semantic hierarchy of spatial representations. Configuration Space, PRMs
Week 9: Subsumption (reactive) architecture. Control Theory. Plant and Sensor Model
Week 10: Coverage, Multi-Robot Coverage
Week 11: State Estimation, Dead reckoning, Landmarks, Bayesian Filtering
Week 12: Particle Filters, Kalman Filters, SLAM
Week 13: Planetary Exploration, On-Orbit Servicing of Satellites, Underwater Robots
Week 14: Review of Material
Week 15: Final

 

Reference Materials

  1. Required textbook: Computational Principles of Mobile Robotics by Gregory Dudek and Michael Jenkin, Second Edition
  2. Lecture notes: On the course web page.

 

Class Requirements

The class grade will be based on the following components:

Homework Policy

Assignments and projects should be submitted in class on the day when they are due. Code should be emailed to the TA.

McGill University values academic integrity. Therefore all students must understand the meaning and consequences of cheating, plagiarism and other academic offences under the Code of Student Conduct and Disciplinary Procedures (see www.mcgill.ca/integrity for more information).