Results of measurements and conclusions derived from them constitute much of the technical information produced by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). In July 1992 the Director of NIST appointed an Ad Hoc Committee on Uncertainty Statements and charged it with recommending a policy on this important topic. The Committee concluded that the CIPM approach could be used to provide quantitative expression of measurement that would satisfy NIST¿s customers¿ requirements. NIST initially published a Technical Note on this issue in Jan. 1993. This 1994 edition addresses the most important questions raised by recipients concerning some of the points it addressed and some it did not. Illustrations.

Accurate Visual Metrology from Single and Multiple Uncalibrated Images presents novel techniques for constructing three-dimensional models from bi-dimensional images using virtual reality tools. Antonio Criminisi develops the mathematical theory of computing world measurements from single images, and builds up a hierarchy of novel, flexible techniques to make measurements and reconstruct three-dimensional scenes from uncalibrated images, paying particular attention to the accuracy of the reconstruction. This book includes examples of interesting viable applications (eg. Forensic Science, History of Art, Virtual Reality, Architectural and indoor measurements), presented in a simple way, accompanied by pictures, diagrams and plenty of worked examples to help the reader understand and implement the algorithms.

An introduction to the techniques and algorithms of the newest field in robotics. Probabilistic robotics is a new and growing area in robotics, concerned with perception and control in the face of uncertainty. Building on the field of mathematical statistics, probabilistic robotics endows robots with a new level of robustness in real-world situations. This book introduces the reader to a wealth of techniques and algorithms in the field. All algorithms are based on a single overarching mathematical foundation. Each chapter provides example implementations in pseudo code, detailed mathematical derivations, discussions from a practitioner's perspective, and extensive lists of exercises and class projects. The book's Web site, www.probabilistic-robotics.org, has additional material. The book is relevant for anyone involved in robotic software development and scientific research. It will also be of interest to applied statisticians and engineers dealing with real-world sensor data.

An introduction to decision making under uncertainty from a computational perspective, covering both theory and applications ranging from speech recognition to airborne collision avoidance. Many important problems involve decision making under uncertainty—that is, choosing actions based on often imperfect observations, with unknown outcomes. Designers of automated decision support systems must take into account the various sources of uncertainty while balancing the multiple objectives of the system. This book provides an introduction to the challenges of decision making under uncertainty from a computational perspective. It presents both the theory behind decision making models and algorithms and a collection of example applications that range from speech recognition to aircraft collision avoidance. Focusing on two methods for designing decision agents, planning and reinforcement learning, the book covers probabilistic models, introducing Bayesian networks as a graphical model that captures probabilistic relationships between variables; utility theory as a framework for understanding optimal decision making under uncertainty; Markov decision processes as a method for modeling sequential problems; model uncertainty; state uncertainty; and cooperative decision making involving multiple interacting agents. A series of applications shows how the theoretical concepts can be applied to systems for attribute-based person search, speech applications, collision avoidance, and unmanned aircraft persistent surveillance. Decision Making Under Uncertainty unifies research from different communities using consistent notation, and is accessible to students and researchers across engineering disciplines who have some prior exposure to probability theory and calculus. It can be used as a text for advanced undergraduate and graduate students in fields including computer science, aerospace and electrical engineering, and management science. It will also be a valuable professional reference for researchers in a variety of disciplines.

A basic problem in computer vision is to understand the structure of a real world scene given several images of it. Techniques for solving this problem are taken from projective geometry and photogrammetry. Here, the authors cover the geometric principles and their algebraic representation in terms of camera projection matrices, the fundamental matrix and the trifocal tensor. The theory and methods of computation of these entities are discussed with real examples, as is their use in the reconstruction of scenes from multiple images. The new edition features an extended introduction covering the key ideas in the book (which itself has been updated with additional examples and appendices) and significant new results which have appeared since the first edition. Comprehensive background material is provided, so readers familiar with linear algebra and basic numerical methods can understand the projective geometry and estimation algorithms presented, and implement the algorithms directly from the book.

The majority of data sets collected by researchers in all disciplines are multivariate, meaning that several measurements, observations, or recordings are taken on each of the units in the data set. These units might be human subjects, archaeological artifacts, countries, or a vast variety of other things. In a few cases, it may be sensible to isolate each variable and study it separately, but in most instances all the variables need to be examined simultaneously in order to fully grasp the structure and key features of the data. For this purpose, one or another method of multivariate analysis might be helpful, and it is with such methods that this book is largely concerned. Multivariate analysis includes methods both for describing and exploring such data and for making formal inferences about them. The aim of all the techniques is, in general sense, to display or extract the signal in the data in the presence of noise and to find out what the data show us in the midst of their apparent chaos. An Introduction to Applied Multivariate Analysis with R explores the correct application of these methods so as to extract as much information as possible from the data at hand, particularly as some type of graphical representation, via the R software. Throughout the book, the authors give many examples of R code used to apply the multivariate techniques to multivariate data.

A modern look at state estimation, targeted at students and practitioners of robotics, with emphasis on three-dimensional applications.