Aerial robotic manipulation integrates concepts and technologies coming from unmanned aerial systems and robotics manipulation. It includes not only kinematic, dynamics, aerodynamics and control but also perception, planning, design aspects, mechatronics and cooperation between several aerial robotics manipulators. All these topics are considered in this book in which the main research and development approaches in aerial robotic manipulation are presented, including the description of relevant systems. In addition of the research aspects, the book also includes the deployment of real systems both indoors and outdoors, which is a relevant characteristic of the book because most results of aerial robotic manipulation have been validated only indoor using motion tracking systems. Moreover, the book presents two relevant applications: structure assembly and inspection and maintenance, which has started to be applied in the industry. The Chapters of the book will present results of two main European Robotics Projects in aerial robotics manipulation: FP7 ARCAS and H2020 AEROARMS. FP7 ARCAS defined the basic concepts on aerial robotic manipulation, including cooperative manipulation. The H2020 AEROARMS on aerial robot with multiple arms and advanced manipulation capabilities for inspection and maintenance has two general objectives: (1) development of advanced aerial robotic manipulation methods and technologies, including manipulation with dual arms and multi-directional thrusters aerial platforms; and (2) application to the inspection and maintenance.

This text is a thorough treatment of the rapidly growing area of aerial manipulation. It details all the design steps required for the modeling and control of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) equipped with robotic manipulators. Starting with the physical basics of rigid-body kinematics, the book gives an in-depth presentation of local and global coordinates, together with the representation of orientation and motion in fixed- and moving-coordinate systems. Coverage of the kinematics and dynamics of unmanned aerial vehicles is developed in a succession of popular UAV configurations for multirotor systems. Such an arrangement, supported by frequent examples and end-of-chapter exercises, leads the reader from simple to more complex UAV configurations. Propulsion-system aerodynamics, essential in UAV design, is analyzed through blade-element and momentum theories, analysis which is followed by a description of drag and ground-aerodynamic effects. The central part of the book is dedicated to aerial-manipulator kinematics, dynamics, and control. Based on foundations laid in the opening chapters, this portion of the book is a structured presentation of Newton–Euler dynamic modeling that results in forward and backward equations in both fixed- and moving-coordinate systems. The Lagrange–Euler approach is applied to expand the model further, providing formalisms to model the variable moment of inertia later used to analyze the dynamics of aerial manipulators in contact with the environment. Using knowledge from sensor data, insights are presented into the ways in which linear, robust, and adaptive control techniques can be applied in aerial manipulation so as to tackle the real-world problems faced by scholars and engineers in the design and implementation of aerial robotics systems. The book is completed by path and trajectory planning with vision-based examples for tracking and manipulation.

The Encyclopedia of Robotics addresses the existing need for an easily accessible yet authoritative and granular knowledge resource in robotic science and engineering. The encyclopedia is a work that comprehensively explains the scientific, application-based, interactive and socio-ethical parameters of robotics. It is the first work that explains at the concept and fact level the state of the field of robotics and its future directions. The encyclopedia is a complement to Springer’s highly successful Handbook of Robotics that has analyzed the state of robotics through the medium of descriptive essays. Organized in an A-Z format for quick and easy understanding of both the basic and advanced topics across a broad spectrum of areas in a self-contained form. The entries in this Encyclopedia will be a comprehensive description of terms used in robotics science and technology. Each term, when useful, is described concisely with online illustrations and enhanced user interactivity (on SpringerReference.com).

We feel the impact of robots on our lives more and more every day. Service robots constitute the broadest and the most exciting applications in this field, such as; personal care and assistance, agriculture, logistics, mobility, medical, and defense-oriented robots. Since service robotics contains many different types of robots, the variety of problems to be solved is also large. Many popular robotic problems, ranging from mechanism design to simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), from motion planning to system security, can be examined in this context. You will find various examples and solutions for this critical area of robotics in this book. We hope that researchers interested in the subject will benefit from this book.

Through expanded intelligence, the use of robotics has fundamentally transformed a variety of fields, including manufacturing, aerospace, medicine, social services, and agriculture. Continued research on robotic design is critical to solving various dynamic obstacles individuals, enterprises, and humanity at large face on a daily basis. Robotic Systems: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications is a vital reference source that delves into the current issues, methodologies, and trends relating to advanced robotic technology in the modern world. Highlighting a range of topics such as mechatronics, cybernetics, and human-computer interaction, this multi-volume book is ideally designed for robotics engineers, mechanical engineers, robotics technicians, operators, software engineers, designers, programmers, industry professionals, researchers, students, academicians, and computer practitioners seeking current research on developing innovative ideas for intelligent and autonomous robotics systems.

The past decade has seen tremendous interest in the production and refinement of unmanned aerial vehicles, both fixed-wing, such as airplanes and rotary-wing, such as helicopters and vertical takeoff and landing vehicles. This book provides a diversified survey of research and development on small and miniature unmanned aerial vehicles of both fixed and rotary wing designs. From historical background to proposed new applications, this is the most comprehensive reference yet.

Robotic research and developments in computing technologies including artificial intelligence have led to significant improvements in autonomous capabilities of robots. Yet, human supervision is advisable and, in many cases, necessary when robots interact with real-world, outside-lab environments. This is due to the fact that complete autonomy in robots has not yet been achieved. When robots encounter challenges beyond their capabilities, a viable solution is to include human operators in the loop, who can support robots through teleoperation, taking complete control or shared control. This monograph focuses on a special form of shared control, namely mixed-initiative, where the final command to the robot is a weighted sum of the commands from the operator and the autonomous controller. The weights (fixed or adaptive), called authority allocation (AA) factors, decide who has more control authority over the robot. Several research groups use different methods to adapt the AA factors online and the benefits of adaptive mixed-initiative shared control have been well established in terms of task completion success and operator usability. However, stability of the overall shared control framework, with communication time-delays between the operator and the robot, is a field that has not been examined extensively. This monograph presents methods to improve performance and stability in shared control so that the possibilities of its applications can be widened. Firstly, methods to improve the haptic feedback performance of teleoperation are developed. Secondly, methods to stabilize adaptive shared control systems, while still ensuring high teleoperation performance, are proposed. The methods are validated on multiple robotic systems and they were applied in several projects, both in space and terrestrial domains. With the aforementioned contributions, this monograph provides an overarching framework to improve synergy between humans and robots. The flexibility of the framework allows integration of existent teleoperation and shared control approaches, which further promotes synergy within the robotics community.