• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.17 no.8
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• pp.807-813
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• 2011

High precision of planning in the preoperative phase can contribute to increase operational safety during computer-aided spinal fusion surgery, which requires extreme caution on the part of the surgeon, due to the complexity and delicacy of the procedure. In this paper, an advanced preoperative planning framework for spinal fusion is presented. The framework is based on spinal pedicle data obtained from CT (Computed Tomography) images, and provides optimal insertion trajectories and pedicle screw sizes. The proposed approach begins with safety margin estimation for each potential insertion trajectory that passes through the pedicle volume, followed by procedures to collect a set of insertion trajectories that satisfy operation safety objectives. The radius of a pedicle screw was chosen as 70% of the pedicle radius. This framework has been tested on 68 spinal pedicles of 8 patients requiring spinal fusion. It was successfully applied, resulting in an average success rate of 100% and a final safety margin of $2.44{\pm}0.51mm$.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.12 no.7
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• pp.693-699
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• 2006

An accurate and compact map is essential to an autonomous mobile robot system. For navigation, it is efficient to use an occupancy grid map because the environment is represented by probability distribution. But it is difficult to apply it to the large environment since it needs a large amount of memory proportional to the environment size. As an alternative, a topological map can be used to represent it in terms of the discrete nodes with edges connecting them. It is usually constructed by the Voronoi-like graphs, but in this paper the topological map is incrementally built based on the local grid map using the thinning algorithm. This algorithm can extract only meaningful topological information by using the C-obstacle concept in real-time and is robust to the environment change, because its underlying local grid map is constructed based on the Bayesian update formula. In this paper, the position probability is defined to evaluate the quantitative reliability of the end nodes of this thinning-based topological map (TTM). The global TTM can be constructed by merging each local TTM by matching the reliable end nodes determined by the position probability. It is shown that the proposed TTM can represent the environment accurately in real-time and it is readily extended to the global TTM.

• Journal of Biosystems Engineering
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.417-424
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• 2002

This study was conducted to develop a vehicle, leading or following a worker at a certain distance to assist laborious transporting works in greenhouses. A prototype vehicle was tested in the practical field conditions using a developed control algorithm. Results of this study were summarized as following: 1. The sensing device consisted of infrared sensors was attached to the front of the vehicle and turning following algorithm was developed to make the vehicle turned as it follows a worker simultaneously. 2. The measured average power consumptions were 110W and 89W, equivalent to 5.2-6.4 hrs battery durations, at low speed with and without the maximum payload, respectively. 3. Results of the travel tests showed that the deviations from the center of row spacing were $\pm$100 mm along the ridge and $\pm$85 mm along the hydroponic bed in the greenhouse. Therefore, the worker-following transport vehicle was feasible to travel along the row without collision in the greenhouse.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2001.05a
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• pp.65-68
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• 2001

The application of a feedback control system in robotic arc welding is becoming more and more demanding than ever before. This requirement arises from the fact that robotic arc welding process needs no manual operator to monitor and manipulate the process parameters and hence a means of controlling the quality of the robotic arc welding process becomes apparent. Arc force sensor employed in this research to monitor the bead geometry of the arc welding process, A relationship between the bead dimension and the arc force distributions was established. Experimental configuration for measurement of arc force was used to quantify the changes in the arc force distributions of the plate being welded. Arc force sensor mounted at the end of the robot wrist was employed to measure the arc force applied to the weld. The sensor information was the used to establish a relationship between welding current and arc force. Arc force sensor have shown to be on of the most sophisticated technique to monitor perturbations that occurred during arc welding process.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.22 no.11
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• pp.895-903
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• 2016

In a fire disaster in a tunnel, people should be rescued immediately using the information obtained from cameras or sensors. However, in heavy smoke from a fire, people cannot be clearly identified by a mounted CCTV, which is only effective in a clear environment. A thermal camera can be an alternative to this in smoky situations and is capable of detecting people from their emitted thermal energy. On the other hand, the thermal image camera has a smaller field of view than an ordinary camera due to its lens characteristics and temperature error, etc. In order to cover a relatively wide area, panoramic image construction needs to be implemented. In this work, a template-based similarity matching algorithm for constructing the panorama image is proposed and its performance is verified through experiments. This scheme provides guidelines for coping with difficulty in image construction, which requires an exact correspondence search for two images in cases of heavy smoke.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.21 no.7
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• pp.634-640
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• 2015

This paper proposes a novel three-dimensional mapping algorithm in Omni-Directional Vision SLAM based on a fisheye image and laser scanner data. The performance of SLAM has been improved by various estimation methods, sensors with multiple functions, or sensor fusion. Conventional 3D SLAM approaches which mainly employed RGB-D cameras to obtain depth information are not suitable for mobile robot applications because RGB-D camera system with multiple cameras have a greater size and slow processing time for the calculation of the depth information for omni-directional images. In this paper, we used a fisheye camera installed facing downwards and a two-dimensional laser scanner separate from the camera at a constant distance. We calculated fusion points from the plane coordinates of obstacles obtained by the information of the two-dimensional laser scanner and the outline of obstacles obtained by the omni-directional image sensor that can acquire surround view at the same time. The effectiveness of the proposed method is confirmed through comparison between maps obtained using the proposed algorithm and real maps.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.519-524
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• 2009

This paper describes a new sensor system for 3D environment perception using stereo structured infrared light sources and a camera. Environment and obstacle sensing is the key issue for mobile robot localization and navigation. Laser scanners and infrared scanners cover $180^{\circ}$ and are accurate but too expensive. Those sensors use rotating light beams so that the range measurements are constrained on a plane. 3D measurements are much more useful in many ways for obstacle detection, map building and localization. Stereo vision is very common way of getting the depth information of 3D environment. However, it requires that the correspondence should be clearly identified and it also heavily depends on the light condition of the environment. Instead of using stereo camera, monocular camera and two projected infrared light sources are used in order to reduce the effects of the ambient light while getting 3D depth map. Modeling of the projected light pattern enabled precise estimation of the range. Two successive captures of the image with left and right infrared light projection provide several benefits, which include wider area of depth measurement, higher spatial resolution and the visibility perception.

• 전자공학회논문지 IE
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.28-36
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• 2006

In this paper, an algorithm to classify the 4 motions of arm and a control system to position control the prosthesis are studied. To classify the 4 motions, we use flex sensors which is electrical resistance type sensor that can measure warp of muscle. The flex sensors are attached to the biceps brchii muscle and coracobrachialis muscle and the sensor signals are passed the sensing system. 4 motion of the forearm - flexion and extension, the pronation and supination are classified from this. Also position of forearm is measured from the classified signals. Finally, A two D.O.F prosthesis arm with RC servo-motor is designed to verify the validity of the algorithm. At this time, fuzzy controller is used to reduce the position error by rotary inertia and noise. From the experiment, the position error had occurred within about 5 degree.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.345-350
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• 2002

In recent years, as changing the habit of eating, the pathology in the colon grows up annually. The colonoscopy is generalized, but if requires much time to acquire a dexterous skill to perform an operation and the procedure is painful to the patient. biomedical and robotic researchers are developing a locomotive colonoscope that can travel safe1y in colon. In this paper, we propose a new actuator and concept of semi-autonomous colonoscope. The micro robot comprises camera and LED for diagnosis, steer- ing system to pass through the loop, pneumatic actuator and bow-shaped flexible supporters to control a contact force and to pass over haustral folds in colon. For locomotion of semi-autonomous colonoscope, we suggest an actuator that is based on impact force between a cylinder and a piston. In order to validate the concept and the performance of the actuator, we carried out the simulation of moving characteristics and the preliminary experiments in rigid pipes and on the colon of pig.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
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• v.9 no.6
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• pp.612-619
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• 2004

Servo motor systems with ball-screw and timing-belt are widely used in NC, robot, FA and industrial applications. However, the nonlinear friction torque and damping effect in machine elements reduce the control performance. Especially tracking errors in trajectory control and very low velocity control range are serious due to the break-away friction and Stribeck effects. In this paper, a new double speed controller is proposed for compensation of the nonlinear friction torque. The proposed double speed controller has outer speed controller and inner friction torque compensator. The proposed friction torque compensator compensates the nonlinear friction torque with actual speed and speed error information. Due to the actual information for friction torque compensator without parameters and mathematical model of motor, proposed compensator is very simple structure and the stability is very high. The proposed compensator is verified by simulation and experimental results.