Personal and ubiquitous robotics Ankur Mehta mehtankucla edu

Personal and ubiquitous robotics Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu

Robots everywhere for everyone • “No need to build good robots” » Jason O'Kane • We need to build bad robots – simple functionality – negligible robustness – limited reliability • Any automation is better than no automation Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 2

Application space • Unspecified problems • Constrained resources • • • Home automation Personal assistance Custom orthotics Research tools Prototyping Education Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 3

A circuit analogy • ASIC: Fully specified design from ground up • Digital standard cells? Breadboards? • FPGA / SOC: Single all-purpose device Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 4

User-driven robotics • Enable the on-demand creation of custom printable electromechanical systems – – Ankur Mehta Design intuitively Fabricate inexpensively Control autonomously Iterate rapidly mehtank@ucla. edu 5

Pervasive personal robotics • “There’s a robot for that. ” • Ubiquitous – Broad userbase – Diverse functionality • Personal – Application specific – On demand Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 6

User-in-the-loop design automation Ankur Mehta Questions Answers Design Specificati on Desig n mehtank@ucla. edu 7

Robot compiler vision Autonomously design, manufacture, and control robotic systems from a high-level task specification Big picture goal: $ vim myrobot. rbt “I want a robot to play chess with me” $ make myrobot Parsing specification Determining behaviors Generating mechanisms Assembling components Printing …done. Success! Ankur Mehta …done. mehtank@ucla. edu 8

A world full of robots? • Design systems – – Ankur Mehta (c. f. app engines, EDA) High level definition (Domain specific languages) Printable manufacturable designs Full-stack verification, validation, and optimization? mehtank@ucla. edu 9

A world full of robots? • Hardware – Integrated manufacturing tools • Structures • Circuits • Sensors and actuators – Components and building blocks • Processing • Communications • Control Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 10

A world full of robots • Algorithms and applications – Control • Distributed • Underactuated • Secure / fault tolerant – Systems • Application-aware integration • Human interfacing Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 11

Software-defined hardware • Structural building blocks • Electrical building blocks • Software building blocks • UI elements Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 12

Common object-oriented interface Parameter constraints Input parameters Subcomponents Composition algorithms Componen t Library Exposed interfaces Implementation algorithms Fabricable specification s Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 13

Hierarchical composition algorithms Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 14

Robot creation pipeline Functional Structural decomposition constraints Behavioral constraints Modular composition • Input: Functional specification • Output: Mission accomplished! Structural specification Co-design implementati on 2 x Parameterized model Realization Fully specified design Fabrication Ankur Mehta Robot Operation mehtank@ucla. edu 15

Custom on-demand robots! Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 16

Integrated single-chip robot? Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 17

UCLA Laboratory for Embedded Machines and Ubiquitous Robots • • • Electromechanical design automation Integrated electromechanical manufacturing Wireless communication circuits and protocols Distributed sensing, actuation, and control Robotics in education • Obligatory plugs – I'm looking for: – Research collaborators – Talented postdocs Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 18

Internet of things (and robots) Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 19

Motivational quotes • • • The perfect is the enemy of the good Just do it Move fast and break things If at first you don't succeed, try again We'll fix it in post Ankur Mehta mehtank@ucla. edu 20