Intelligent Material Handling Systems: Autonomous Retrieval of Buried Objects

这项研究的目标是开发和集成自主检测、发现和找回易碎埋藏物所需的感知、规划和操作技术。这种技术在以下方面有应用：从垃圾填埋场回收废物集装箱、从浅埋中回收弹药、暴露海底电缆以及获取地外土壤/岩石样本。这项拟议的工作将促进当前在以下领域的知识：处理岩土材料的自主机器人的软件体系结构和推理系统，构建埋藏对象的三维表示的感知，以及从地质或漫射材料中解救对象的操作。

The objective of this research is to develop and integrate the perception, planning, and manipulation technologies necessary for autonomously detecting, uncovering, and retrieving fragile buried objects. Such technology has application in the retrieval of waste containers from landfills, recovery of munitions from shallow burial, exposure of cables beneath the ocean floor, and acquisition of extraterrestrial soil/rock samples. The proposed work will advance current knowledge in the fields of software architectures and reasoning systems for autonomous robots working with geomaterials, perception for building three- dimensional representations of buried objects, and manipulation for extricating objects from geo or diffuse material.