COMP 14 Computer Science, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence.ppt

COMP 14: Computer Science, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence June 22, 2000 Nick Vallidis Announcements P6 is due tomorrow Tomorrow is a review class - bring questions you want answered!!!! Today What does a computer scientist do? Robotics Artificial Intelligence Whats a computer scientist do? Lets ask Jeeves first: Jeeves answer My answer: Computers are a new, complex kind of tool Computer scientists figure out how to do useful things with computers: graphics medical imaging networking sharing information (the web) robotics artificial intelligence! Where do we work? There are basically three places that use computer scientists: Academia - colleges and universities for teaching and research Research institutions - NASA, plus other companies that do research (Microsoft, Bell Labs, etc.) Industry - programmers (writing the software that people use on their computers) Robotics a robot is basically a mechanism that operates under computer control The main purpose they serve these days is to do boring, repetitive tasks The fun ones are research robots and thats what Ill talk about Basic Robot Has three parts: Reads sensors to understand environment Computes what to do based on sensors Uses actuators to do it Sensors Actuators Many possible sensors: video cameras tilt sensors force sensors Many possible actuators: Electric motors Hydraulics Pneumatics Mobile Robotics All the stuff Ive done is in the field called Mobile Robotics. means that robot can move around on its own power as opposed to most industrial robots, which are giant arms bolted to the floor There are two types of mobile robots: walking robots wheeled robots Examples, examples Well do this by example… Robots I worked on at Carnegie Mellon: Daedalus Lunar Rover (Nomad) Black Widow Robot I worked on at NASA: Dexter Daedalus Designed to be a planetary explorer Daedalus an example of a frame walker Nomad Designed to test ideas for a commercial trip to the moon (LunaCorp) Nomad Went to the Atacama desert o