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The purpose of this paper is to put forward a nvew reconfigurable multi-mode walking-rolling robot based on the single-loop closed-chain four-bar mechanism, and the robot can be changed to different modes according to the terrain.

Based on the topological analysis, singularity analysis, feasibility analysis, gait analysis and the motion strategy based on motor time-sharing control, the paper theoretically verified that the robot can switch between the four motion modes.

The robot integrates four-bar walking, self-deforming and four-bar and six-bar rolling modes. A series of simulation and prototype experiment results are presented to verify the feasibility of multiple motion modes of the robot.

The work presented in this paper provides a good theoretical basis for further exploration of multiple mode mobile robots. It is an attempt to design the multi-mode mobile robot based on single loop kinematotropic mechanisms. It is also a kind of exploration of the new unknown movement law.

This paper presents a survey of research into interactive robotic systems for the purpose of identifying the state of the art capabilities as well as the extant gaps in this emerging field. Communication is multimodal. Multimodality is a representation of many modes chosen from rhetorical aspects for its communication potentials. The author seeks to define the available automation capabilities in communication using multimodalities that will support a proposed Interactive Robot System (IRS) as an AI mounted robotic platform to advance the speed and quality of military operational and tactical decision making.

This review will begin by presenting key developments in the robotic interaction field with the objective of identifying essential technological developments that set conditions for robotic platforms to function autonomously. After surveying the key aspects in Human Robot Interaction (HRI), Unmanned Autonomous System (UAS), visualization, Virtual Environment (VE) and prediction, the paper then proceeds to describe the gaps in the application areas that will require extension and integration to enable the prototyping of the IRS. A brief examination of other work in HRI-related fields concludes with a recapitulation of the IRS challenge that will set conditions for future success.

Using insights from a balanced cross section of sources from the government, academic, and commercial entities that contribute to HRI a multimodal IRS in military communication is introduced. Multimodal IRS (MIRS) in military communication has yet to be deployed.

Multimodal robotic interface for the MIRS is an interdisciplinary endeavour. This is not realistic that one can comprehend all expert and related knowledge and skills to design and develop such multimodal interactive robotic interface. In this brief preliminary survey, the author has discussed extant AI, robotics, NLP, CV, VDM, and VE applications that is directly related to multimodal interaction. Each mode of this multimodal communication is an active research area. Multimodal human/military robot communication is the ultimate goal of this research.

A multimodal autonomous robot in military communication using speech, images, gestures, VST and VE has yet to be deployed. Autonomous multimodal communication is expected to open wider possibilities for all armed forces. Given the density of the land domain, the army is in a position to exploit the opportunities for human–machine teaming (HMT) exposure. Naval and air forces will adopt platform specific suites for specially selected operators to integrate with and leverage this emerging technology. The possession of a flexible communications means that readily adapts to virtual training will enhance planning and mission rehearsals tremendously.

Interaction, perception, cognition and visualization based multimodal communication system is yet missing. Options to communicate, express and convey information in HMT setting with multiple options, suggestions and recommendations will certainly enhance military communication, strength, engagement, security, cognition, perception as well as the ability to act confidently for a successful mission.

The objective is to develop a multimodal autonomous interactive robot for military communications. This survey reports the state of the art, what exists and what is missing, what can be done and possibilities of extension that support the military in maintaining effective communication using multimodalities. There are some separate ongoing progresses, such as in machine-enabled speech, image recognition, tracking, visualizations for situational awareness, and virtual environments. At this time, there is no integrated approach for multimodal human robot interaction that proposes a flexible and agile communication. The report briefly introduces the research proposal about multimodal interactive robot in military communication.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a tetrahedral mobile robot with only revolute joints (TMRR). By using rotation actuators, the mechanism of the robot gains favorable working space and eliminates the engineering difficulties caused by the multilevel extension compared with liner actuators. Furthermore, the rolling locomotion is improved to reduce displacement error based on dynamics analysis.

The main body of deforming mechanism with a tetrahedral exterior shape is composed of four vertexes and six RRR chains. The mobile robot can achieve the rolling locomotion and reach any position on the ground by orderly driving the rotation actuators. The global kinematics of the mobile modes are analyzed. Dynamics analysis of the robot falling process is carried out during the rolling locomotion, and the rolling locomotion is improved by reducing the collision impulse along with the moving direction.

Based on global kinematics analysis of TMRR, the robot can realize the continuous mobility based on rolling gait planning. The main cause of robot displacement error and the corresponding improvement locomotion are gained through dynamic analysis. The results of the theoretical analysis are verified by experiments on a physical prototype.

The work introduced in this paper is a novel exploration of applying the mechanism with only revolute joints to the field of tetrahedral rolling robots. It is also an attempt to use the improved rolling locomotion making this kind of mobile robot more practical. Meanwhile, the reasonable engineering structure of the robot provides feasibility for load carrying.

This study aims to make the mobile robot better adapt to the patrol and monitoring in industrial field substation area, a multi-mode mobile carrying mechanism which can carrying data collector, camera and other equipment is designed.

Based on the geometric axis analysis and interference analysis, the multi-mode mobile carrying mechanism is designed. The screw constraint topological theory and zero-moment point (ZMP) theory is used to kinematic analysis in mechanism mobile process.

The mobile carrying mechanism can realize the folding movement, hexagonal rolling and quadrilateral rolling movement. A series of simulation and prototype experiment results verify the feasibility and actual error of the design analysis.

The work of this paper provides a mobile carrying mechanism for carrying different data acquisition equipment and surveillance camera in industrial field substation zone. It has excellent folding performance and mobile capabilities. The mobile carrying mechanism reduces the workload of human being and injuries suffered by workers in industrial substation area.

The purpose of this paper is to propose an indirect design for sliding surface as a function of position and velocity of each joint (for mounted manipulator on base) and center of mass of mobile base which includes rotation of wheels. The aim is to control the mobile base and its mounted arms using a unified sliding surface.

A new implementation of sliding mode control has been proposed for wheeled mobile manipulators, regulation and tracking cases. In the conventional sliding mode design, the position and velocity of each coordinate are often considered as the states in the sliding surface, and consequently, the input control is found based on them. A mobile robot consisted of non-holonomic constraints, makes the definition of the sliding surface more complex and it cannot simply include the coordinates of the system.

Formulism of both sliding mode control and non-singular terminal sliding mode control were presented and implemented on Scout robot. The simulations were validated with experimental studies, which led to satisfactory analysis. The non-singular terminal sliding mode control actually had a better performance, as it was illustrated that at time 10 s, the error for that was only 8.4 mm, where the error for conventional sliding mode control was 11.2 mm.

This work proposes sliding mode and non-singular terminal sliding mode control structure for wheeled mobile robot with a sliding surface including state variables: center of mass of base, wheels’ rotation and arm coordinates.

The purpose of this paper is to present a distributed multiple mobile robot system that provides a collaborative control and simulation environment.

A CORBA‐based cooperative system is designed to implement a robotic layered cooperative mechanism. The mechanism has three layers: mission, transport and execution. In order to realize a flexible and effective communication in the cooperative mechanism, an extended robot event service (federated event service) is proposed to improve the cooperative system's real time performance.

Experimentation has proved the validity and effectiveness of the system. The federated event service's latency is approximately 9 percent less than the standard event service latency when the CPU is determined.

The robotic modularized system includes the map‐building, path‐planning, robot task‐planning, simulation and actual robot control function modules, and uses CORBA to integrate the whole system. It is easy to implement a layered cooperative mechanism for multiple mobile robots. Given the problem on multiple robots cooperation latency, a useful extended robot event service is proposed.

The paper focuses on the distributed functional modular architecture, and the multiple robots cooperative layered mechanism. In the mechanism, an extended robot event service (federated event service) is proposed to reduce the cooperative system's real time latency. The conducted experiment validates the proposed system with a good performance for multiple mobile robots' cooperation.

The purpose of this paper is to put forward a rolling assistant robot with two rolling modes, and the multi-mode rolling motion strategy with path planning algorithm, which is suitable to this multi-mode mobile robot, is proposed based on chessboard-shaped grid division (CGD).

Based on the kinematic analysis and motion properties of the mobile parallel robot, the motion strategy based on CGD path planning algorithm of a mobile robot with two rolling modes moving to a target position is divided into two parts, which are local self-motion planning and global path planning. In the first part, the mobile parallel robot can move by switching and combining the two rolling modes; and in the second part, the specific algorithm of the global path planning is proposed according to the CGD of the moving ground.

The assistant robot, which is a novel 4-RSR mobile parallel robot (where R denotes a revolute joint and S denotes a spherical joint) integrating operation and rolling locomotion (Watt linkage rolling mode and 6R linkage rolling mode), can work as a moving spotlight or worktable. A series of simulation and prototype experiment results are presented to verify the CGD path planning strategy of the robot, and the performance of the path planning experiments in simulations and practices shows the validation of the path planning analysis.

The work presented in this paper is a further exploration to apply parallel mechanisms with two rolling modes to the field of assistant rolling robots by proposing the CGD path planning strategy. It is also a new attempt to use the specific path planning algorithm in the field of mobile robots for operating tasks.

The purpose of this paper is to improve the traditional bug algorithms for the navigation of mobile robots in unknown environments by considering the limitations in previous works such as generating long path, limited to static environments as well as ignoring implementation issues. With this purpose, a new bug‐type algorithm termed Distance Histogram Bug (DH‐Bug) is proposed for overcoming these limitations.

DH‐Bug redefines the traditional motion modes and switching criteria to shorten the path length. In order to extend the framework of the traditional bug algorithms to tackle the navigation problem in dynamic environments, a new mode and the related switching conditions are designed for dealing with moving obstacles. Moreover, a realization method termed the Distance Histogram (DH) method which takes many implementation issues into full account is proposed for implementing DH‐Bug on real robots.

DH‐Bug is convergent in static environments and it also guarantees “approximate” convergence based on several reasonable assumptions when there are moving obstacles. Simulations results show that DH‐Bug generates shorter average path length than some classical Bug algorithms in static environments and it also performs well in most simulations that contain moving obstacles except for some extremely adverse scenarios which have been discussed in the paper. Experiments on real robots further verify its applicability in both static environments and dynamic environments containing moving obstacles.

Compared with previous works, DH‐Bug has three main contributions. First, in static environments, it can shorten the average path length than many classical bug algorithms in the premise of guaranteeing convergence. Second, it can be applied in dynamic environments containing moving obstacles. Third, unlike the previous bug algorithms that always ignore the practical implementation issues, DH‐Bug presents not only an abstract concept, but also a realization approach for realizing this concept on real robots.

The purpose of this paper is to explore a novel control approach for swift and accurate positioning and tracking of a mobile robot. Coordinated movement of the mobile robot-body and chameleon-inspired binocular “negative correlation” visual system (CIBNCVS) with neck has rarely been considered in conventional mobile robot design. However, it is vital in swift and accurate positioning and tracking of the target. Consequently, it is valuable to find an optimized method where the robot-body, the biomimetic eyes and neck could achieve optimal coordinated movement.

Based on a wheeled mobile robot, a biomimetic dual Pan–Tilt–Zoom visual system with neck is constructed. The cameras can rely on the unique “negative correlation” mode of chameleon vision, and cooperate with neck, achieving swift search of the 160° scope in front of the robot. Genetic algorithm is used to obtain optimal rotation of the neck and robot-body. Variable resolution targeting is also applied for accurate aiming. Using these two approaches, we can achieve efficient targeting with low energy consumption. Particle filter algorithm is further utilized for real-time tracking.

In the proposed approach, swift and accurate positioning and tracking of the target can be obtained. The rationality of the approach is verified by experiments on flat and sandy terrains with satisfactory results.

This paper proposes a novel control approach for wheeled mobile robots, which achieves coordinated movement of the robot-body and CIBNCVS with neck concerning time and energy saving in the process of swift and accurate tracking.

The purpose of this paper is to propose an overall deformation rolling mechanism based on double four-link mechanism. The double quadrilateral mobile mechanism (DQMM) has two switchable working modes which can be used to traverse different terrains or climb over obstacles.

The main body of the DQMM is composed of a double four-link mechanism which sharing a public link and two symmetrical steering platforms which placed at both ends of the four-link mechanism. The steering platforms give the DQMM not only steering ability but also reconnaissance ability which can be achieved by carrying sensors such as cameras on steering platforms. By controlling the deformation of the DQMM, it can switch between two working modes (tracked rolling mode and obstacle-climbing mode) to achieve the functions of rolling and obstacle-climbing. Dynamic simulation model was established to verify the feasibility.

Based on the kinematics analysis and simulation results of the DQMM, its moving function is realized by the tracked rolling mode, and the obstacle-climbing mode is used to climb over obstacles in structured terrains such as continuous stairs. The feasibility of the two working modes is verified on a physical prototype.

The work of this paper is a new exploration of applying “overall closed moving linkages mechanism” to the area of small mobile mechanisms. The adaptability of different terrains and the ability of obstacle-climbing are improved by the combination of multi-modes.