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- News & Events
Upcoming Events
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Land, Sea, Air & Space
Operations -
See the Expeditions & Operations
listing for upcoming missions involving the lab's students and robotic
systems. |
Highlights from Fall 2007
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New Experimental Results - The
Lab's work in cluster space control of multi-robot systems
has resulted in outstanding experimental results. These include
3-robot motion control using the Lab's new UWB tracking
system as well as formation control of 2 robotic
kayaks. Graduate students involved in this work
include Ignacio Mas, Ogi Petrovic, Jose Acain, and Paul Mahacek. In
the photo to the left, the 2 robotic kayaks sail in
formation in Stevens Creek Reservoir as part
of Paul Mahacek's Masters thesis research |
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Kitts
Receives MBARI Appointment
- Dr.
Kitts has been named an Adjunct Researcher with
the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute,
granting him Principle Investigator status for
joint projects. |
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Highlights from Summer 2006
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- Launch News -
RSL is a partner with NASA Ames Research Center as part of the
GeneBox space
mission that launched in early July on a Dnepr rocket. GeneBox launched as
a test package on the Bigelow Aerospace Genesis Vehicle.
GeneBox is a precursor test for the GeneSat-1 mission that is
scheduled for launch from Wallops Island
in December 2006. RSL graduate students Mike
Rasay and Ignacio Mas are assisting the
NASA team by processing GeneBox data for analysis by the science
team.
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- Masters Theses - Congratulations to RSL
COEN students Tran To, Brian Tully and Ray Chindaphorn for completing
their Master's Theses
and Degrees on multi-robot navigation. All
worked on the 2-robot version of the Decabot experimental
system. Tran developed a cluster space trajectory controller,
Brian developed a human-in-the-loop cluster space controller, and Ray
developed a cluster space obstacle avoidance controller. Their
work will be appearing in several journal articles in 2007.
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- MicroSwift
Deployed! The maiden
deployment of the microSwift ROV was successfully
conducted in mid-July in Lake Tahoe. MicroSwift
has been designed as a low-cost
very shallow water (<100 ft) ROV that can be rapidly
deployed/stowed (< 10 min) and has no high voltage
safety constraints. It worked like a champ! Thanks
to Paul Mahacek, Todd Berk,
Fritz Huizenga and Giovanni
Minelli for their efforts this spring and summer to
support this project.
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- Plug and Play Satellites! Several
members of the ONYX microsatellite team (to include John Shepard,
Phelps Williams and Will Nguyen) conducted a highly successful
"plug and play" demonstration with collaborators from
Washington Univ in St. Louis at the August AIAA Conference on Small
Satellites. Using a data/power/communication/connection standard
and flight computers developed by RSL, students from satellite teams
from each school swapped payloads before a live audience and proceeded
to perform a full functional integration of the payloads within
minutes. To follow that up, the teams "took requests"
and controlled arbitrary functions and components of one satellite
through the use of components and subsystems on the other. 5
unplanned "encore" demonstrations were conducted by request
from industry and government space officials.
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Highlights from Spring 2006
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- Design Conference Honors!
- Congratulations to RSL seniors
who won top honors in the 2006 School of Engineering Senior Design
Conference. These teams included:
- Mantaris ROV - Interdisciplinary Engineering
Best of Session, Minh Dao, Eli Girod, Giovanni Minelli, Matthew Nelson
and Denislav Petkov
- ONYX Satellite - Electrical Engineering Best
of Session, Jonathan Crabtree, Sam Moraleda and William Nguyen.
- ONYX Satellite - Mechanical Engineering Best
of Session, Bryn Asher, Dawn Dennis, Andrew Gulick, Ananya Nanda, and
John Shepard.
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- Robotic Mission to Lake
Tahoe a Success - RSL's
2-day May 2006 deployment of the Triton ROV in Lake Tahoe
was a wonderful success. More than 20 SCU
undergraduates completed their ENGR 180 Marine Operations
certification by crewing on the cruise. In addition,
a senior design team demonstrated the use of a new robotic
manipulator. And, of course, Paul Mahacek and
Giovanni Minelli braved the frigid waters once again to
gather some additional rock samples for our science
partners from the Univ. of Nevada at Reno, the U.S.
Geological Survey, etc.
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Masters Theses - Congratulations to RSL
ME students Matt Kalkbrenner and Pat
Connolly for completing their Master's Theses
and Degrees on multi-robot navigation. Pat
developed a cluster space trajectory controller for the 2 Omnibot rovers,
and Matt developed a human-in-the-loop cluster space piloting system
allowing the same two robots to collaboratively carry objects. |
Highlights from Winter 2006
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ONYX Satellite design
review - The undergraduate ONYX satellite
team conducted a very successful Critical Design Review as a required
element of the U.S. Air Force / NASA University Nanosatellite
Program. Representatives from the Air Force and local industry
served as reviewers for the all-day review which was conducted on campus
and which included several functional demonstrations of the satellite's
engineering model. |
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Highlights from Fall 2005
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- Masters Thesis - Congratulations to RSL
EE student Ryan Ishizu for completing his Master's Thesis
and Degree on multi-robot navigation.
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Design Project Honors!
- Congratulations to the following
RSL project teams honored for excellence in design in the 2005
national Lincoln Foundation Design Competition:
- Merit Award – The WASP Autonomous
Surface Vessel, Paul Mahacek, Robyn Kobashigawa, and Aaron Schooley.
- Merit Award – Omnibot II, Alfredo
Cuaresma, Joseph de la Fuente, Adam Moreland, Kevin Kerns, and Vivek
Reddy.
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- High School
Robotics Outreach - For the third year in a row,
over 100 local high school
students and educators attended a high school robotics workshop on
campus during this quarter. Held in the Engineering Center, the workshop was
sponsored by the Western Region Robotics Forum and provided numerous
tutorials on robotic fundamentals to help prepare students for
projects such as US FIRST, Botball and other programs. The
students also toured RSL facilities.
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| Conferences -
Lab students and faculty participated and published in a number of
conferences during the quarter. In October, Prof. Jeff Ota and
student Paul Mahacek attended and presented papers on RSL marine
robotics initiatives at the Annual MTS/IEEE Oceans Conference in
Washington, D.C. Prof. Kitts chaired the 2005 University Space
Systems Symposium in Honolulu in November, and students Mike Rasay
and PJ Mall presented work on current internet-based control of
robotic systems. Prof. Kitts also presented work being
performed at the NASA Space Technology Center as part of the 2005
INSA Space Policy Conference in Montana in September. In addition, a
paper co-authored by Kitts was presented at the ASME Annual Meeting
in Orlando. |
An important research meeting
with colleagues from Northeastern University |
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Highlights from Summer 2005
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| ASV Stability
Tests - As part of his summer
internship at the Montery Bay Aquarium Research Institute, RSL
student Paul Mahacek performed stability tests on the Lab's
Autonomous Surface Vessel. Paul also developed several
improvements to the ASV to include alterations to the pontoons in
order to improve stability. RSL student Giovanni Minelli
also contributed to these efforts as part of his co-located
internship with the NOAA West Coast and Polar Research Center's
Moss Landing Office. |
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The crew relaxes after The
Trip From Hell! |
SmallSat '05 - Lab
students attended the Annual AIAA/USU Conference on Small
Satellites in order to man a joint GeneSat exhibit with
collaborators from NASA Ames as well as to present the Preliminary
Design Review for the ONYX satellite at the co-located University
Nanosatellite Program meeting. In addition, 2 papers
co-authored by Kitts were presented at the conference: one on the
GeneSat program and one on RSL's distributed command and data
handling avionics system which is being used by several
universities in their flight programs. |
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- Summer projects
- Lab projects for the summer included a
variety of activities being performed by interns as well
as students from the MECH/ELEN
311 Telerobotics classes. Systems in development
included the 7-robot Decabot system, a set of web-based
hardware-in-the-loop laboratory experiments, and
development of the Lab's satellite mission operations network in
support of several spacecraft programs.
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Highlights from Spring 2005
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- Robotic
Mission to Lake Tahoe a Success - RSL's
2-day May 2005 deployment of the Triton ROV in Lake Tahoe
was a wonderful success. More than a dozen SCU
undergraduates completed their ENGR 180 Marine Operations
certification by crewing on the cruise. In addition,
the ops team demonstrated several new "records"
for Triton to include the deepest dive (650+ ft), the
longest dive (3+ hours), and several sessions of
"live-boating" in which the unanchored R/V
LeConte followed Triton on science transects.
Funded by IEEE and SCU/RSL, the Triton mission supported
several science studies by geologists from the U.S.
Geological Survey and the University of Nevada Reno.
Results of the data gathered during this mission has
resulted in 3 publications at the 2005 GSA and AGU
Conferences.
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- Design Conference Honors!
- Congratulations to the following
RSL project teams honored for their performance at the May
School of Engineering Senior Design Conference:
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- Decabots: An Experimental Testbed for
Collaborative Multi-Robot Navigation - COEN Students
Chinaphorn, To and Tully and EE students Young and En Huang.
Advisor: C. Kitts. Best Overall Interdisciplinary
Project and Best Overall Computer Engineering Project.
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- Enterprise Class Mission Control Software
for the NASA GeneSat-1 Spacecraft - COEN Students Van
Buskirk and Weiler. Advisor: C. Kitts. Best
of Session in Computer Engineering.
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- Omnibot II: The Design and Implementation
of Dual Robot Collaborative Object Transportation - ME
students de la Fuente, Cauresma, EE student Moreland, and COEN
students Reddy and Kerns. Advisor: C. Kitts. Best of Session
in Interdisciplinary Engineering.
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- Honors!
- Congratulations to the following
RSL project teams that include Computer Engineering students
which were honored by the Computer Engineering Department for Technical
Excellence:
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- Decabots: An Experimental Testbed for
Collaborative Multi-Robot Navigation - COEN Students Ray
Chinaphorn, Tran To and Brian Tully. Advisor: C. Kitts
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- Enterprise Class Mission Control Software
for the NASA GeneSat-1 Spacecraft - COEN Students Tom
Van Buskirk and Kevin Weiler. Advisor: C. Kitts.
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BotBall 2005! For
the 3rd year in a row, the
Lab hosted the annual Northern Regional BotBall
tournament in the Leavey Center in early April. BotBall is a national high school
competition in which teams of students develop Lego robots to
perform tasks in a head-to-head competition. More than 300
local students participated in this event. |
Highlights from Winter 2005
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Masters Thesis - Congratulations to RSL
ME student Ben Blaine for completing his Master's Thesis
and Degree on thermoelectric multifunction structures for
spacecraft applications. |
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Highlights from Fall 2004
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- NASA Ames
GeneSat - RSL
students and faculty have joined the GeneSat
mission team. RSL are working with scientists and
engineers from NASA Ames, Stanford, San Jose
State, and Cal Poly in order to develop, test,
launch and operate the Genesat microsatellite
which will test the effects of microgravity on E.
Coli. RSL will lead the mission operations
phase of the mission once the satellite is
launched in Fall 2005.
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- Decabots -
In collaboration with NASA Ames researchers, RSL
students and faculty have initiated the development of a
10-robot navigation testbed to be used to demonstrate
advanced UAV control technologies.
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- Test
inflation
- In late September 2004, static line test
inflations of the new 16' outdoor airship OV-1 were
performed in Oklahoma. This project is a
collaboration between the lab, Highships LLC , and
Takeoff Technologies. RSL is providing the
on-board avionics and control systems for this series
of vehicles.
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- Conferences -
In November, RSL faculty and students participated in the 2004 Space
Systems Symposium in Waikaloa, Hawaii where they reported on and made
new plans for collaborative research activities with university
partners in the U.S. and Japan. Prof. Kitts was the U.S.
Chairman for this event. In October, RSL faculty and students
also attended the local RoboNexus expo at the Santa Clara convention
center.
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| High School
Robotics Outreach - Over 100 local high school
students and educators attended a high school robotics workshop in
mid-December. Held in the Engineering Center, the workshop was
sponsored by the Western Region Robotics Forum and provided numerous
tutorials on robotic fundamentals to help prepare students for
projects such as US FIRST, Botball and other programs. The
students also toured RSL facilities. |
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Design Project Honors!
- Congratulations to the following
RSL project teams honored for excellence in design in the 2004
Lincoln Foundation Design Competition:
- Silver Award – Haptic Integration of
an IBM Robotic Manipulator
- Silver Award – OBSIDIAN: Design of a
Microsatellite
- Merit Award – Autonomous Underwater
Robot
- Merit Award – Portable, Agile,
Steerable Communications antenna
- Merit Award – The Mantaris ROV
- Merit Award
- Design and Implementation of Multiple Holonomic Robots
- In addition, this outstanding showing of projects
earned SCU a Lincoln Foundation School Award.
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- Fall 2004 Graduate Theses. - RSL
ME student Ben Blaine completed his Master's Thesis and Degree on
thermoelectric multifunction structures for spacecraft
applications.
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Highlights from Summer 2004
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- 3rd Place Finish
in International UAV Competition - The
Lab's Aerial Robotics Team placed 3rd in the Annual AUVSI
International UAV competition at Pax River, MD in late June.
The team of Ryan Becker, Chris Borowski and Ogi Petrovic
successfully flew one of their planes (developed as part of their
senior design project) through an autonomously navigated route in
order to identify ground targets at Webster Field. The SCU
team competed against several graduate student teams and was the only team out of all 11 entrants to demonstrate an
automated take-off.
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Summer Conferences-
- Two graduate student papers were presented at the
AIAA "Unmanned Unlimited" Conference held in September in
Chicago. The papers included A Distributed Satellite
Operations Testbed for Anomaly Management Experimentation (Schuet
and Kitts) and Vision-based control specification for two
holonomic robots (Neumann and Kitts).
- Lab personnel participated in the Collaboration
in Sustainable Development Conference held in August
in El Salvador. During the conference several new collaborative
ventures involving the use of robotic technology for environmental
monitoring were initiated.
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- Recent
Outreach Events
- Lab staff and students have supported a
number of outreach activities for more than 400
students this summer. Events include a
hands-on half-day robotics/mechatronics workshop for
80 students in SCU's Summer Engineering Program,
demonstrations to more than 300 students from the
National Youth Leadership Forum, a workshop for
students in the Nanotechnology Summer Program, and a variety of
tours and projects with local school children.
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- Summer projects
- Lab projects for the summer included a
variety of activities being performed by interns as well
as students from the MECH 310 Mechatronics IV and MECH/ELEN
311 Telerobotics classes. Systems in development
include a set of collaborating Amigobots, a Matlab-based
expert system for the Sapphire microsatellite, an avionics
suite for airships, an environmental monitoring station,
upgraded functionality for the RAMAC disk drive
restoration project, and a set of web-based
hardware-in-the-loop laboratory experiments. In
addition, 5-10 operational contacts are made with the
orbiting Sapphire microsatellite each week.
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Highlights from Spring 2004
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- Successful Triton
Deployment in Lake Tahoe - In late
May, RSL students and faculty deployed the Triton ROV in Lake
Tahoe in support of several geologic studies by personnel from
the U.S. Geological Survey and the University of Nevada,
Reno. The successful science mission enabled the
collection of data to support theories regarding the historical
formation of the paleoshoreline. Triton was deployed of the U.C.
Davis boat R/V LeConte. RSL students received credit for
the event as part of the senior design project program and the
ENGR 180 Marine Operations class.
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Streaming Media - Check
out these videos (for broadband connections) covering two of
our biggest Spring 2004 events:
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- Spring 2004 Graduate Theses! - RSL EE Graduate Student Daniel Schuet
completed his Master's Thesis and Degree with a focus
on distributed, model-based satellite operations.
Also, RSL staff member Bryan Palmintier completed his Stanford University Engineers Degree
Thesis and Degree with a focus on distributed satellite
avionic systems.
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- Mission
Ops Underway
- RSL students are currently conducting on-orbit
operations for the Sapphire microsatellite from mission operations
facilities on campus and in the Lab's ops center in the Space Technology Center in the NASA Ames
Research Park.
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- Operations include analyzing the state of
health of the spacecraft and using the communications services
provided by the satellite. They are also performing a research
experiment involving the use of advanced model-based reasoning
algorithms for managing the operation of the mission.
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- Launched in 2001, Sapphire
was developed by graduate students at Stanford University.
Several RSL faculty/staff played key development and leadership
roles in the design of Sapphire during their graduate studies; in
addition, several former RSL students assisted with the testing of
Sapphire prior to its launch.
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Design Conference Honors!
- Congratulations to the following
RSL project teams honored for their performance at the May
School of Engineering Senior Design Conference:
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- Omnifleet: Design of Two
Holonomic Robots - Mark Barycza, Patrick Connolly,
Ryan Kottenstette, Eric Redwine. Best Overall Project
in Interdisciplinary Engineering.
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- Haptic Gripper for an
Industrial Robot - Adrian Cuadra, Krista Hirasuna,
Matt Kalkbrenner, Scott Gunther, Colson Griffith, and Carol
Reiley. Best of Session, Interdisciplinary Engineering Session
1.
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- UAV Formation Flying - Ryan
Becker, Chris Borowski, and Ogi Petrovic. Best of Session,
Interdisciplinary Engineering Session 3.
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- RACE Satellite Communications
Network - Peter Salas, Carleton Cheng. Best of
Session, Computer Engineering Session 2.
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Honors!
- Congratulations to the following
RSL project teams that include Computer Engineering students
which were honored by the Computer Engineering Department for Technical
Excellence:
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Omnifleet: Design of Two
Holonomic Robots - COEN Student: Erick Redwine.
Advisors: N. Quinn and C. Kitts. |
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UAV Formation Flying -
COEN Students: Ryan
Becker, Chris Borowski, and Ogi Petrovic. Advisors: N.
Quinn and C. Kitts. |
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Haptic Gripper for an
Industrial Robot - COEN student: Carol Reiley.
Advisors: N. Quinn and C. Kitts |
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RACE Satellite Communications
Network - COEN Students: Peter Salas, Carleton
Cheng. Advisors: N. Quinn and C. Kitts. |
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- Mechatronics Public Demo
- This year's undergraduate mechatronics competition
involved skeeball-playing robots.
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Recently Quoted - Prof.
Kitts was interviewed and quoted for a Scientific
American article regarding the low-cost spacecraft
launch industry. His was also interviewed for a recent
article an article in The
Japan News on the effect that U.S. export control laws
are having on international student-based satellite projects.
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| BotBall 2004! In
mid-April, the
Lab hosted the annual Northern Regional BotBall
tournament in early April. BotBall is a national high school
competition in which teams of students develop Lego robots to
perform tasks in a head-to-head competition. More than 300
local students participated in this event. |
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Highlights from Winter 2004
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- It Moves! -
The RAMAC moves! The omnibot moves! The motors turn!
Progress is being made on a number of the lab's projects. Proof and
pictures coming soon!
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- UAV Realtime Video
Broadcasting - As part of a current senior
design project, students have developed a new fleet of three
80" wingspan aircraft. Realtime video broadcasting
was recently demonstrated as part of this project.
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Space
Technology Center Grand Opening - On February 5, the NASA
Ames Research Park Space Technology Center was formally opened with a
reception, open house, and press conference. Speakers included Ames
Research Center Director Scott Hubbard, SCU Dean of Engineering Daniel
Pitt, and others. The Space Technology Center is a collaborative
facility with representation from the satellite/robotics programs at Santa
Clara University, Stanford University and San Jose State University.
Within the Center, the Robotic Systems Laboratory has opened a mission
operations facility in order to conduct field operations with on-orbit
spacecraft, aircraft, and rovers.
 - Students control and display robots in the
RSL Mission Ops Center within the Space Technology Center.
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IEEE Aerospace Conference
Publications
- Several student research projects were be
featured in publications at the IEEE Aerospace Conference
held in March 2004 in Big Sky Montana. Each of these evolved from
work in the MECH 311 Telerobotics Research class taught each summer.
Publications include: Characterization
of Delay-Induced Piloting Instability for the Triton Undersea
Robot (Bulich, Klein, Watson, Kitts), A Behavioral
Control Approach to Formation-Keeping Through an Obstacle
Field (Ochoa, Dougherty, Randles, Kitts), and Anomaly Detection
Using the Emerald Nanosatellite On-Board Expert System
(Lee, Watson, Kitts, Stang, Palmintier).
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Highlights from Fall 2003
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- University Space Systems
Symposium -
Lab students, staff, and faculty participated
in the 6th Annual USSS event in Honolulu in November.
Prof. Kitts is the U.S. Chairman for this Symposium.
Details on the Symposium are found at the event's website.
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SCU Robotics Program
Featured in IEEE Magazine - A peer reviewed article
on the
SCU Robotics Program appears in the Robotics in
Education special issue of IEEE Robotics and Automation
Magazine, one of the most influential publications in the
international robotics community. |
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- AUV Project Initiated
- Capitalizing on a significant donation of equipment from
the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, lab students have
initiated work on a new Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV).
Efforts during this first year of work will focus on developing a
low-cost shallow water thruster to propel the vehicle. Basic
guidance instrumentation will also be acquired and integrated into the
vehicle.
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- 2003 Senior Design Project Teams Win
Lincoln Foundation Awards
- Several of the lab's 2002-03 senior design projects
with Mechanical Engineering involvement won Awards
in the National Lincoln Arc Welding Foundation Design
Competition.
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Highlights from Summer 2003
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| RSL Hosts SES Robotics
Workshop -
During the first two weeks of August, RSL students, faculty and staff
conducted a multi-day 13-hour robotics workshop as part of the 4-day
in-residence SCU Summer Engineering Seminar (SES) program. This annual
event is conducted by the SCU School of Engineering and is attended by
42 high school students/week with an interest in science, math,
technology, and engineering. The Robotics element of this
year's SES program reviewed robotic technologies in general as well
as many of RSL's devices. In addition, a LEGO-based |
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- robotics competition
will be conducted. RSL students Rob Watson, Van Teresa Bui,
Christina Jimenez and Steve Millward designed the competition
and served as mentors for the student teams.
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Lab Hosts NYLF
Students - On July 28-29, RSL students, faculty and
staff conducted a series of exhibitions for 400 top high school
students from across the country who were attending the National Youth
Leadership Forum in San Jose. Students learned about robots and
had a chance to operate the lab's Triton undersea robot as well as a
variety of mobile land rovers. |
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- High Altitude Balloon
Flight - The lab developed a suite
of avionics for a high altitude balloon flight conducted by
collaborators at Washington University in St. Louis. The
package went up on July 17 - but we don't know where it came
down! Stay tuned for more news on the ongoing recovery
efforts.
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- Mantaris -
The Mantaris thrusters are turning!!! Stay tuned for news on the next
step - getting Mantaris swimming at low speed in the pool - targeted
for the last week of July!!!
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- Space Technology Center
- In July, the lab moved into its new room in the Space
Technology Center at the NASA Research Park in Moffett Field.
The Space Technology Center is being developed to host
aerospace-related classes, events, and collaborative projects for
Santa Clara University, Stanford University, San Jose State
University, and the California Polytechnic State University. RSL
is using its space to house a centralized mission operations center
for university-class satellite and robotic missions.
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- Middle School Robotics Workshop
- During late June, lab faculty/staff/students
conducted an afternoon workshop on robotics for 18 young women in the
Chabot Science Center's summer technology workshop. Students
learned about undersea robots, teleoperated several mobile robots, and
toured SCU and it's engineering laboratories.
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- Telerobotics Research Class -
Prof. Kitts is conducting the yearly telerobotics research
class. Nine graduate students are conducting engineering
research projects which will lead to a series of conference and
journal publications. This year's projects include
internet-based piloting of the Triton undersea robot, behavior-based
formation control of land rovers, and a fault management system for
the Emerald nanosatellites.
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- Lab Receives Grants
- During the past two months, the lab has
received $85,000 of internal and external grants to
continue its work on a variety of robotics-related
projects. External projects include running the 6th
Annual University Space Systems Symposium, developing
student-based aerospace systems, and
continuing a NOAA study on using realtime
weather data for spacecraft mission planning. Internal grants will fund the
development of low-cost thrusters for underwater robots,
control system upgrades for two industrial manipulators,
and a research project relating to the use of ultra-wideband
communication transceivers for multi-robot collaboration.
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Highlights from Spring 2003
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Maiden
Flight - In late
May, students developed and tested a new remotely piloted aircraft to
support new work in UAV technology. This plane will be
used as part of a senior design project during the 2003-04
academic year; this interdisciplinary project will explore the use of
autopilot-based navigation techniques to support remote
sensing and potentially the implementation of automated
"follow-the-leader" formation control.
- Continued work on the first UAV built
earlier in the year has included the installation of a GPS
receiver for flight trajectory sensing and
archiving. In addition, a realtime video broadcast
system has been developed to support remote control from a
"pilot's view". A screen shot of this
video feed is shown to the right.
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- Undergraduate
Mechatronics Class Holds Public Competition
- The Mech 143 / Elen 123 Mechatronics class
demonstrated their dueling robots for the campus community in a fun-filled evening of
technological splendor. The competition required teams of
students to build a robot that would walk "10
paces" and then turn to shoot the hat off a
competitor.
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- 2003 Marine
Technology ROV Scholarship - Junior
Jennifer Kerwin was awarded this scholarship based on her
contributions to the Santa Clara University underwater
robotics program and her interest in marine technology.
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| Monterey Undersea Robot Deployment
- In late
May 2003, students deployed Triton off the Cypress Sea boat in Monterey
Bay. The deployment allowed operational practice of collaborative
robot - SCUBA diver activities. In addition, students from this
year's Marine Operations classes crewed the mission in order to
complete the requirements of that class. A number of local high
school students also participated in the mission as part of the
Lab's outreach efforts.
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- Projects
Exhibited at School of Engineering Awards Banquet -
RSL students showcased a variety of the lab's robotic systems at the
2003 School of Engineering Distinguished Alumni Awards Banquet in
mid-May. On hand were Jen Kerwin and Paul Mahacek (Triton and
Seafox undersea robots), Chris Liebertz (omnibot), Rob Watson
(Emerald nanosatellite), and Len Diaz, Alan Moore, Kristen Kristich
and Michelle Enyeart (formation robots). Freshman Andrew
Guistani hosted the showcase exhibition - an original, restored IBM
RAMAC disk drive, the first random access disk drive in history
(circa 1957).
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- 2003 School of Engineering Senior Design
Conference Winners - The Several of
the Lab's projects took top honors in this year's Conference:
| Formation Robots,
Alan Moore, Michelle Enyeart, Kristen Kristich, Lemuel
Diaz, advised by Prof. Quinn and Prof. Kitts,
Interdisciplinary Session 2 Best of Session and overall
Best of Discipline for Interdisciplinary projects. |
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| Big Blimpin':
Development of an Advanced Autonomous Airship,
Michael Neumann, Chris Paetsch, Shelley Schilz, Daniel
Schuet, advised by Prof. Kitts, Interdisciplinary Session
1 Best of Session. |
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Mapping Robots,
Bernard Farrales and Francis Chan, advised by Prof. Quinn
and Prof. Kitts, Computer Engineering Session 3 Best of
Session. |
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| Emerald Space Tether,
Russell Dunning, Steve Millward, Seamus Porter, advised by
Prof. Kitts, Mechanical Engineering Best of Session and
overall Best of Discipline. |
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- Congratulations to these students! Theses are
available online by following the Publications &
Presentations link.
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- BotBall 2003!
- The Robotic Systems Laboratory hosted the
2003 BotBall Competition's Northern California Regional
Tournament in early April at the Leavey Center. Several
hundred local middle and high school students took part in this
activity, which involved the development of microcontroller-based
LEGO devices that competed in a head-to-head competition with
opponents. RSL faculty, students, and staff assisted the KISS
Institute, the national organizer of the BotBall program, in
planning and implementing the day-long event.
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- Satellite Workshop -
Students from the University of Texas at Austin
as well as from Washington University in St. Louis recently
participated in a 2-day workshop on the design and use of the
Robotic Systems Laboratory's distributed command and data
handling system for spacecraft and other robotic systems.
RSL is a funded partner in new satellite development projects at
each of these schools as part of the 2003 University
Nanosatellite Program.
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Recent Robot Demonstrations
- Video Clips - Recent robot demonstrations include
rover follow-the-leader
using ultra-wideband transceivers as well as a mobility tests (rotate
and crab)
for a new omni-drive robot. Both experiments were performed as
part of the interdisciplinary senior design program
(MECH/ELEN/COEN 196). |
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Highlights from Winter 2003
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National Geographic Weekly
- Footage from a Triton deployment
to Lake Tahoe in the Summer of 2001 was recently shown on the
National Geographic Weekly television show. The mission
was conducted in collaboration with geologists from the
Scripps Institute of Oceanography. |
- Low-Cost Thruster - Students
in the graduate Ocean Engineering class (Pat Connolly and Scott
Hills) collaborated with two students in the undergraduate
Robotics Laboratory class (Paul Mahaceck and Adam Moreland) in
order to develop a prototype low-cost thruster. The lab hopes to
further develop this component for inexpensive and robust
shallow-water applications.
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- UAV Flight Demos - Juniors
Ryan Becker and Ogi Petrovic continued development of the lab's
84" wingspan RC aircraft by installing an on-board GPS
receiver (capable of in-flight data-logging), a real-time video
transmission system, and a video overlay board enabling GPS data
to be superimposed on the video signal.
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2 New Satellite
Projects - As part of the 2003
University Nanosatellite Program, RSL will develop the command
and data handling, communications, and ground operations network
for two new microsatellite programs. The first
collaboration is with U.T. Austin's FASTRAC program (shown here)
which will fly two spacecraft implementing GPS-based relative
navigation. The second collaboration is with Washington Univ. in
St. Louis which is develop a satellite that demonstrates a
variety of advanced technology.
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- High Altitude
Balloon Development Program Unveiled - A small
high altitude balloon prototype was unveiled at the 2003
American Meteorological Society's Weatherfest Conference in Long
Beach in February. RSL is part of a collaborative research
team with HighShips (a start-up company specializing in the
development of low-cost long-duration high altitude balloons),
Global Space League (a non-profit organization developing
hands-on field science missions for K-12 students), and TakeOff
Technologies (a technology consulting company) to develop
technology supporting low-cost long-duration flights of such
balloons for a variety of research and commercial applications.
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- SCU Robotics Program
Featured in IEEE Magazine - A peer reviewed article
on the SCU
Robotics Program has been accepted for publication
in an upcoming issue of the IEEE Robotics and Automation
Magazine, one of the most influential publications in the
international robotics community.
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Highlights from Fall 2002
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- Spacecraft Beacon
Monitoring Study Appears in Journal -
A peer reviewed article
on the cost-effectiveness of spacecraft health beacon
monitoring technology has been accepted for publication in the Journal of
Reducing Space Mission Cost. The experimental study was
conducted by Prof. Kitts and his collaborator, Prof. Michael Swartwout
from Washington University in St. Louis, using the Sapphire
microsatellite. Health beacon technology allows
expert-system-based anomaly detection algorithms to cost-effectively
notify ground-based control operators regarding the need for
operational intervention when conducting a space mission.
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- The
Triton undersea robot's digital control system is
described in a new peer reviewed publication
appearing in the Proceedings of the 2002
IFAC Conference on Mechatronic Systems. The paper was
presented by students Oli Francis and Graeme Coakley at the
conference, held in Berkeley
in December 2002.
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- University Space Systems
Symposium -
Lab students, staff, and faculty participated
in the 5th Annual USSS event in Honolulu in November.
Prof. Kitts is the U.S. Chairman for this Symposium.
Details on the Symposium are found at the event's website.
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- Maiden
Aircraft Flight - Junior
Ryan Becker took the lab's new 81" wingspan RC
aircraft out for its maiden flight in mid-October and
dazzled a crowd with loops and a flawless landing.
Future work on the system will add a variety of capabilities to the craft for remote
observation and automated flight.
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- 2002 Senior Design Project Teams Win
Lincoln Foundation Awards
- Each of the lab's 2001-02 senior design projects
with Mechanical Engineering involvement won a Merit Award
in the National Lincoln Arc Welding Foundation Design
Competition.
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Highlights from Summer 2002
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Video Clips of Recent Robot
Demonstrations
- Recent robot demonstrations include rover
relative positioning using ultra-wideband sensors and a blimp
altitude control system using a new Atmel-based on-board
microcontroller system. Take a look at these .avi video clips!
Both demonstrations were a result of the Summer Telerobotics
Research Workshop and will support future conference publications. |
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- Summer Telerobotics Research Workshop
- Prof. Kitts conducted the second Telerobotics
Research class with eleven graduate and honors undergraduate students
this summer. Students are engaged in projects requiring them to
design and develop an engineering innovation to a new or existing
robot, experimentally verify its performance, validate its benefit for
a user or pilot, and summarize results through a professional
publication in/at an industry/society journal or conference.
Current projects include internet control of the Triton undersea
robot, an enhanced pilot interface for the Roverwerx manipulator, a
voice-controlled blimp, local and internet-based PID control of an IBM
7545 manipulator, and formation control of a fleet of land rovers
using ultra-wideband sensing technology.
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- Paper on Emerald CDH System
Presented at SmallSat Conference - A
paper authored by lab faculty and staff was presented at the 16th AIAA/USU
Conference on Small Satellites in Logan Utah in August. The
paper detailed the design of the distributed command and data handling
system being developed for the 2-satellite Emerald mission.
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- Summer Education Seminar
Workshop -
Several lab members presented a hands-on underwater robotics workshop
for SCU's Summer Education Seminar, a high school summer program for
underrepresented students with an interest in science, technology, and
engineering. Students learned about the principles behind
undersea vehicles and were able to pilot the Triton robot in the Leavy
Center pool.
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- Prof. Kitts and the Robotics
Lab wins SCU Technology Innovation Award -
The $15,000 grant will allow a team to apply the lab's internet-based
robotic control technology to the development of internet-based
engineering laboratory equipment.
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- Weather Satellite Receive
Station Successfully Tested
- Dan Winter and Kevin Murray successfully assembled
and tested a NOAA weather receiver system in order to directly receive
weather photos from several low Earth orbiting NOAA
satellites.
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Highlights from Spring 2002
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- Satellite Communications
Stations Installed at SCU and in Hawaii -
As part of their senior design project, a team of 6 seniors
installed amateur radio stations suitable for satellite
operations on the top of the SCU Engineering Center and on the
campus of Leeward Community College in Pearl City Hawaii.
The stations are operated via the internet, and the system
includes a centralized scheduling system allowing educators and
researchers around the world to request use of the system to
support the control of their space-based experiments.
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Left - SCU dual yagi antenna system on roof
of the Engineering Center
Right - Hawaii communication station. In the
background is an observatory which is part of the lab's
distributed telescope network.
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- Students Take Honors in
the School of Engineering Senior Design Conference -
Several lab student design teams took top honors in the yearly
industry-reviewed Senior Design Conference held in
mid-May. The SAINT Automated Observatory team was awarded
the Best Overall Interdisciplinary Project award, the Best
Project Award for their Interdisciplinary Session, and was
selected to present their work to the School's Industry Advisory
Board. The Mantaris Instrumentation Team won the Best
Overall Electrical Engineering Award and the Best Project Award
for their Electrical Engineering Session. And the Robosoccer
team was awarded the Best Project Award for their
Interdisciplinary Session.
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- Undergraduate
Mechatronics Class Holds Public Competition
- The Mech 143 / Elen 123 Mechatronics class
demonstrated their tape-follow'in, ball-grabb'in, beacon-watch'in
bots for the campus community in a fun-filled evening of
technological splendor.
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| Underwater Robotics Day -
The Mantaris senior design team held SCU's first Underwater
Robotics Day, a half-day event that reviewed the lab's
underwater technology program, explained the basic principles
behind submersible vehicles, and allowed attendees to pilot the
Triton vehicle. In attendance were students from a local
high school class, members of a local Girl Scout troop, and
additional members of the public. The event was
financially supported by the School of Engineering's Engineering
Alumni Board. |
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- Underwater Manipulator
Successfully Tested
- The Mantaris underwater robot team successfully
demonstrated the robustness and utility of their
student-designed manipulator. In tests at Deep Ocean
Engineering, the team pressure tested the device to an
equivalent depth of 2500 feet, 25% deeper than their design
requirement. In later pool tests while attached to the
Triton robot, a pilot was able to use the arm to grasp a target
vehicle (the small Seafox robot).
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 - Manipulator attached to Triton
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 - Triton grabs Seafox!
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 - An underwater repair job!
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- Young Minds at Work Exhibit
- Several lab members presented a hands-on robotics
exhibit at Lockheed-Martin's Young Minds at Work event held in
Sunnyvale in April. Presented robots included Roverwerx, the
Eye-in-the-Sky blimp, and the Triton underwater robot.
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Automated Navigation for
Roverwerx- In late March,
sophomore Ogi Petrovic demonstrated automated 'goto' navigation
on the Roverwerx terrestrial rover. The demonstration
included the use of a compass and a Thales differential GPS
receiver. |
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Highlights from Winter 2002
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- Students Participate in
Marine Symposium - In early
March, freshmen and sophomores in the Laboratory exhibited
several Santa Clara University undersea robots at the National
Marine Sanctuary's New Technologies: Revealing the Secrets of
the Sea Symposium, held at Monterey Bay.
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- Laboratory Opens
New Office at the Ames Research Park - In
February, the Laboratory opened a new office at Moffett Field as
part of the Ames Research Park initiative. This new office
will support several collaborations with NASA Ames researchers
involving the development and control of robotic vehicles.
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Rover Research Grant
- Through a collaboration with Professors Neil Quinn (COEN), Garret Okamoto
(EE), and John Birmingham (PHYS), the lab has been awarded $35,000 from the SCU
Technology Steering Committee in order to acquire and extend an array of mobile
robots. |
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Lincoln Design Awards -
Last year's seniors have been named as winners
of several Lincoln Arc Welding Foundation Design Awards. This national
university competition acknowledges excellence in mechanical engineering and
system design.
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Students Near
Completion of the Triton Digital Upgrade -
Since the Summer of 2001, Oli Francis (EE Senior) and Graeme Coakley
(COEN grad student) have been upgrading the Triton undersea robot's
control system to include digital control, automatic depth and
heading control, and internet integration. In early January,
they experimentally tuned the heading lock system in the campus
pool. |
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Left - Triton stays looked on a 200
degree heading, even in the presence of a substantial wake from a nearby
vessel.
Right - Graeme and Olid demonstrate
human-in-the-loop control (top) and then "hands-off" automatic
heading control. |
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Orion Microsatellite Fabrication
- As part of a collaboration with MIT and Stanford University,
students fabricated the flight structure and developed the attitude control
software for the Orion II
satellite.
Highlights from Fall 2001
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Emerald Microsatellites
Featured in Embedded Systems Programming Magazine -
The December 2001 issue of Embedded Systems Programming Magazine profiled
the Emerald microsatellite project and its microcontroller-based
command and data handling system. Emerald is a collaborative project with
Stanford University and is being funded by NASA and the U.S. Air Force. |
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More Internet-Based Robotic Piloting -
In November, students and staff
piloted the Triton undersea robot via the internet. Staff member Mike Rasay
piloted the vehicle while sitting at the pilot workstation located in the
lab's control center in room EC323E. Mike use a dual joystick console to
direct the vehicle while viewing realtime video on his workstation
monitor.
| Bronco Blimp
Makes Debut During Basketball Half-time - Through a
sponsorship by Globalstar, LLC, the lab debuted the Bronco Blimp, a 10
ft airship that is being flown as part of the half-time entertainment
during women's and men's basketball games. The blimp is also being used
as a technology testbed in the lab's senior design project
program; the airship team is extending an internet-based piloting system
and will be implementing an automatic control system. |
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Conference Participation -
In early November, 4 faculty/staff/students from the lab participated in the
4th Annual University Space Systems Symposium held in Kona Hawaii.
Students presented the lab's work in robotic systems and participated in
working groups aimed at developing international research
collaborations. Prof. Kitts was the U.S. Chairman of the event.
Three faculty/staff/students also attended the Oceans 2001 Conference in
Honolulu HI during this same period. Lab graduate Jeff Zabel presented
his design of an underwater vision-based relative position sensor, a system he
developed as part of his senior design project during the 2000-2001 academic
year.
Graduate Mechatronics
Certificate Program - In October, the Mechanical Engineering
Department approved a new graduate certificate program in mechatronic systems
engineering.
Collaborative Research Agreement
signed with NASA Ames Research Center - On behalf the the
laboratory and other research groups, Santa Clara University signed a
Memorandum of Understanding with NASA Ames Research Center in order to
formalize ongoing and future research collaborations. The agreement
specifically acknowledges the desire to collaborate in the development of
aerospace and robotic technology, and it provides the foundation for the lab's
involvement in the Ames Research Park Initiative.
New Research Contract with the
Lockheed Martin Corporation - The lab has just initiated a new
research project with researchers at Lockheed Martin's Advanced Technology
Center. This project involves the development of a advanced design
environments for complex robotic space systems.
Astronomy Consortium -
On behalf of the Lab, Santa Clara University has joined a consortium of
academic institutions to develop a geographically distributed, internet-linked
network of astronomical observatories. Partner institutions include U.C.
Berkeley, the University of Hawaii's Leeward Community College, and others.
Research Award - The laboratory has been
awarded an International Society of Optical Engineering 2001 SPIE Research
Grant for its use of optical instruments in robotic applications.
Highlights from Summer 2001
Triton Deployment in Lake Tahoe - For three days in
late August, students and staff deployed the Triton undersea vehicle in Lake
Tahoe in support of scientists at the Scripps Institution of
Oceanography. Video-based science data was collected in support of
geology studies focusing on fault lines in the Lake's region. Technical
highlights included the first field demonstration of a new microcontroller-based
interface for the Triton control console, a system developed by students Oli
Francis (EE senior) and Graeme Coakley (COEN grad student). In addition,
mission commander and pilot Chad Bulich (ME grad student) demonstrated
remarkable skills in piloting a degraded vehicle during the third day of
operations after a thruster control board died a glorious and fiery death.
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Left - Triton heads away from the ship
and prepares to dive at the location of a geologic fault-line.
Right - The deployment crew with members from SCU
and Scripps. SCU students/staff include Chad Bulich, Kevin Murray, Chris
Kitts, Oli Francis, and Graeme Coakley. Not pictured were Brian
Glynn and graduate Eric Hulin. |
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Internet-Based Robotic Piloting - Students and staff
piloted the Roverwerx terrestrial rover and the Triton undersea vehicle via
the internet as part of the Robotic Control Network research program.
The demonstrations included wireless communication links, joystick pilot
interfaces, point-to-point robot-to-pilot video streaming, and public internet
broadcasts of on-board video. These systems extended the control
architecture developed by Mike Rasay (staff) for his senior design project.
Students Brian Glynn and Drew Zillman (COEN seniors) provided key innovations
involving video streaming, internet application interfacing, and peripheral
integration.
Autonomous Control Demonstrations - Students and
staff developed and implemented rudimentary automatic control systems for
several robots. Ogi Petrovich (COEN sophomore) provided a key role in
the overall software integration of the Roverwerx terrestrial rover, and he
integrated differential GPS and compass sensors in order to enable 'goto'
navigation commanding. In addition, as part of the Triton
microcontroller-based control console interface, ad-hoc depth and heading
control were implemented.
Telerobotics Course - Prof. Kitts taught a graduate
seminar in telerobotics (MECH296) which involved seven students and staff. As
part of this course, motor control, sonar, and camera pan/tilt subsystems on
the Roverwerx terrestrial rover were developed and upgraded. The main
thrust of the course were a set of independent research projects in which
students developed technical innovations in the control of various laboratory
robots. These projects included: the microcontroller-based control
of the Triton undersea vehicle (Oli Francis, EE senior and Graeme Coakeley,
COEN grad student), the development of a behaviorally-based layered control
system for undersea robot autonomous navigation (Chad Bulich, ME grad
student), the development of anthropomorphically-based hyper-DOF joysticks for
robot pilots (Adam Klein, ME grad student), and vision-based control of
undersea vehicles (Jay Singh, ME grad student).
Development of the Emerald Nanosatellites - Students
and staff worked diligently in the flight vehicle fabrication, assembly, and
test of the Emerald nanosatellites. These two spacecraft will
demonstrate key satellite formation flying technologies and will be launched
from the Space Shuttle in 2003. Students Adam Klein (ME grad student), Bryan
Failing (ME senior), Kevin Murray (ME junior), Steve Millward (ME junior), and
Zephyr Andrew (ME senior) led the joint SCU-Stanford team in order to
fabricate the flight structures. Students Trevor Cross, Dan Oranen, and Zach
Randles (COEN seniors) took the lead on microcontroller programming for
several subsystems. Sydney Chan (EE junior) and Charlie Chao (EE grad
student) assisted with electronics development, and staff members Pascal Stang
and Bryan Palmintier coordinated efforts involving command and data handling
issues.
Deployment Trailer - The lab purchased a 14 ft
transport trailer to assist with robotic deployments - and to help store much
of the underwater program equipment.
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