麻豆淫院

(麻豆淫院Org.com) -- The latest YouTube sensation isn鈥檛 a puppy that dances to Lady Gaga or a kitten that opens beer bottles. By using unmanned aerial vehicles called quadrotors, two Ph.D. candidates at the School of Engineering and Applied Science have built an autonomous airborne construction crew able to build small structures鈥攁nd in the process they鈥檝e captured the attention of millions.

Mechanical engineering students Quentin Lindsey, 26, and Daniel Mellinger, 25, wrote algorithms that enable the quadrotors to discern which specific building piece to pick up, and where it should be placed.

鈥淭his is a paradigm changer,鈥� says Penn Engineering Deputy Dean for Education Vijay Kumar, the students鈥� advisor. 鈥淚f you look at robots, they do things from the ground up. Think about how the military uses robots on the ground. For the first time we鈥檙e able to build things from the top down. This is really a completely new capability being developed.鈥�

Lindsey and Mellinger began writing the algorithms in Penn鈥檚 General Robotics, Automation, Sensing and Perception (GRASP) Lab in November. Just three months later, the quadrotors were able to autonomously construct cubic structures, towers, pyramids and walls.

鈥淲e tell it what structure to build, then we have a method that figures out the assembly plan鈥攂asically a list of parts and where they go,鈥� Mellinger says. 鈥淭hen the quadrotors line up and quadrotor one picks up part one and puts it in place, quadrotor two picks up part two and puts it in place, and so on.鈥�

The quadrotors 鈥渒now鈥� where each part is located, and they鈥檙e able to grasp it using a gripper, the students explain. The part, made from plastic or PVC pipe, is attached to the body of the structure using a magnet.

鈥淥bviously you鈥檙e not going to go to a construction site right now and see these parts, but these are parts you can modify and conceivably scale up and make them into real parts that you could actually build things with,鈥� Lindsey says.

The project is an initial foray into building more complicated structures with quadrotors and robots.

鈥淔ull-size helicopters now are used in real construction projects,鈥� Mellinger says. 鈥淭o think you might be able to add autonomy to that with robotic quadrotors might not be too far off in the future.鈥�

In the meantime, the video 鈥淐onstruction with Quadrotor Teams鈥� has created quite a stir. Just over two minutes long, it shows a squad of Penn quadrotors snatching up construction parts and building a mini-tower in a lab. The quadrotors sound like a swarm of very intense bees, and watching them go about their work is captivating.

The video has received more than 400,000 hits on YouTube, and television鈥檚 popular faux newscaster Stephen Colbert recently featured it during the 鈥淭hreatDown鈥� segment of his show 鈥淭he Colbert Report鈥� on Comedy Central.

鈥淔or years I have been warning about the threat of robots rising up against their human masters,鈥� Colbert said during the broadcast. 鈥淪cientists have reached a new milestone in our enslavement. Flying robot drones. Today they鈥檙e constructing a three-foot tower, tomorrow it鈥檚 a sprawling prison for three-foot prisoners.鈥�

While the media attention is flattering and fun, Kumar says it shouldn鈥檛 mask the serious science behind the project.

鈥淭hese robots are completely autonomous, they are not being [remotely controlled],鈥� he explains. 鈥淲e want to fly into spaces where humans either don鈥檛 want to fly or cannot fly. If you can imagine a hostage setting in a building, I can send these guys into the building and they can be the eyes and the ears of rescue personnel outside. I can go into a damaged building after a natural disaster and help victims.鈥�

The researchers say the project may also be a precursor to autonomous robotic construction.

鈥淚n our lab we have a lot of experiments and projects that are ground based and we have a lot of experiments that are air based,鈥� Lindsey says. 鈥淏ut we don鈥檛 have any that are combined. This is one of the few times where you can actually put the two different kinds of robots together. This is just the first step.鈥�

A successful and satisfying step, Mellinger says. 鈥淚t鈥檚 always fun as an engineer to think about solving a problem and then see it work. It鈥檚 just a bonus that it鈥檚 gotten so much attention and people like it so much.鈥�