InSAC – National Institute of Science and Technology for Cooperative Autonomous Systems Applied to Security and Environment

Abstract

This proposal aims the creation of a National Institute of Science and Technology (INCT-SAC) to deal with cooperative autonomous systems. Motivated by Brazil’s large territory and population size, wide ranging geographic features, and economic and social issues, we intend to solve problems related to security and environment. This INCT will address some of these challenges by proposing novel networked robotic systems for underwater maintenance, automobile and cargo transportation, grow of crops, remote inspection and actuation, and surveillance. Oil extraction in the pre-salt layer, located 250Km from the coast and more then 2km deep in the ocean, has demanded specific solutions in terms of logistics, maintenance in deep waters, remote operations of platforms, and national security; Urban mobility has been faced with an expressive growing in the number of automobiles in the last years, the Brazilian car fleet is now the 4th in the world.

Car manufacturers and robotics researchers have been interested in partial or full automation of vehicles navigation systems; In terms of Amazon rainforest and agriculture, Brazil has two important and complementary objectives in terms of preservation and to increase crop productivity. Advances in communication, computing, and embedded control technologies allow the application of networked systems to large environmental monitoring and coordination of multiple mobile agents for exploration and manipulation. The proposed INCT will bring together an outstanding set of Universities, Industries, and Research Institutes of Brazil and abroad. The latest advances in systems theory and emerging information technology to enable the design and implementation of distributed networks for observation, mobility, and manipulation provide the fundamental scope of actual problems we intend to solve. Specifically, this proposal will consider autonomous navigation of aerial vehicles in low altitude to deal, for instance, with power transmission line and gas pipe inspection to alleviate the pilot’s workload and with motion planning strategies for aggressive landing of an actual cargo transportation helicopter in a mobile platform; Robotic systems based on lighter-than-air vehicles for environmental monitoring, surveillance and communication applied to the Amazon region. They will provide a virtual sensory barriers against deforestation, telecommunication services to remote and small population areas, technological solutions to coastal communities and remote settlements; Modeling and design of autonomous heavy vehicles with on-line payload measurement system.

Advanced driver assistance systems will be developed to deal with safety, congestion and traffic cooperation, and with overloading freight transportation; Coordination of heterogeneous aerial and mobile robots in outdoor environment to deal with helicopters and convoy of trucks based on fault tolerant control systems; Coordination of heterogeneous robots applied to orange plantation monitoring. This project aims to estimate the amount of fruits, pest detection, the rate of development and degree of maturity of the plants; Modeling and design of distributed underwater vehicles for inspection and service of industrial installations. They will deal with servicing, repair, and assembly tasks of oil and gas platforms. Basic development for autonomous and fault tolerant control systems. It will be related with development of control techniques for systems under stochastic variations in its dynamics, with the development of measurement based approach to engineering design and techniques for system identification, and with control of small robots described by swarms of insects which will be performed based on bio-inspired systems.

Coordinator

Marco Henrique Terra

Participating Institutions

This institute is an initiative of several universities, research institutes, and companies. It is composed by researchers of electrical, mechanical, and aeronautics engineering, and computer science with participation of biologists, and conservationists. We organized the Institute into five (5) areas: aerial robotics, terrestrial robotics, underwater robotics, control system theory and innovation.

• The area of aerial robotics is headed by Guilherme Augusto Silva Pereira (UFMG) and involves the researchers from Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) with Alexandre Rodrigues Mesquita, Bruno Vilhena Adorno, Fernando de Oliveira Souza, Guilherme Vianna Raffo, Leonardo Antônio Borges Torres, Luciano Cunha de Araújo Pimenta, Luis Antônio Aguirre, Paulo Henrique Iscold Andrade de Oliveira; Technological Institute of Aeronautics (ITA) with Luiz Mirisola; Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar) with Rafael Vidal Aroca; Center for Robotics of University of São Paulo at São Carlos (CRob/USP) with Roseli Aparecida Francelin Romero; Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM) with José Reginaldo Hughes Carvalho; Mamirauá Sustanable Development Institute (IDSM) with João Valsecchi do Amaral, Josivaldo Ferreira Modesto, Francisco Modesto de Freitas Júnior, Emiliano Esterci Ramalho and Miriam Marmontel; Center for Information Technology Renato Archer (CTI) with Geraldo Silveira, Samuel Siqueira Bueno; University of Campinas (Unicamp) with Ely Carneiro de Paiva; Omega Aerosystem Company with Christian Amaral, from Campo Largo, Paraná, BR; Flight Technologies Company (FT) with Benedito Carlos de Oliveira Maciel, from São José dos Campos, BR; Near Earth Autonomy, a spin-off of Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute, USA, with Marcel Bergerman.
• The area of ground robotics is headed by Denis Fernando Wolf (USP) and involves the researchers from Center for Robotics of University of São Paulo at São Carlos (CRob/USP) with Carlos Dias Maciel, Marco Henrique Terra, Roseli Aparecida Francelin Romero, Valdir Grassi Junior, Vilma Alves de Oliveira; Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar) with Roberto Santos Inoue, Tatiana de Figueiredo Pereira Alves Taveira Pazelli; Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) with Alexandre Rodrigues Mesquita, Bruno Vilhena Adorno, Fernando de Oliveira Souza, Guilherme Augusto Silva Pereira, Guilherme Vianna Raffo, Leonardo Antônio Borges Torres, Luciano Cunha de Araújo Pimenta, Luis Antônio Aguirre, Paulo Henrique Iscold Andrade de Oliveira; Federal University of Ceará (UFC) with Guilherme de Alencar Barreto; University of Campinas (Unicamp) with Ely Carneiro de Paiva; Center for Information Technology Renato Archer (CTI) with Geraldo Silveira, Samuel Siqueira Bueno; Federal University of Amazonas (UFAM) with José Reginaldo Hughes Carvalho; Near Earth Autonomy, a spin-off of Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute, USA, with Marcel Bergerman and Scania Latin America Company.
• The area of underwater robotics is headed by Ramon Romankevicius Costa (UFRJ) and involves the researchers from Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) with Alessandro Jacoud Peixoto, Eduardo Vieira Leão Nunes, Fernando Cesar Lizarralde, Liu Hsu; Federal University of Minas Gerais with Guilherme Augusto Silva Pereira.
• The area of control system theory is headed by Oswaldo Luiz do Valle Costa (USP) and involves the researchers from Center for Robotics of University of São Paulo at São Carlos (CRob/USP) with Marco Henrique Terra, Carlos Dias Maciel, Luís Fernando Costa Alberto, Vilma Alves de Oliveira; Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ) with Liu Hsu, Ramon Romankevicius Costa; Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) with Luis Antônio Aguirre.
• The area of innovation is headed by José Otávio Armani Paschoal, (Inova Institute); Benedito Carlos de Oliveira Maciel (Flight Technologies); Samuel Siqueira Bueno (CTI ); Denis Wolf (ICMC-USP); Paulo Henrique Iscold Andrade de Oliveira (UFMG); Alessandro Jacoud Peixoto (UFRJ); Josivaldo Ferreira Modesto (NIT/IDSM ); and José Reginaldo Hughes Carvalho (UFAM).