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Navigation, Positioning and Wireless Communication of the Companion Robot in Outdoor Conditions

A special issue of Energies (ISSN 1996-1073). This special issue belongs to the section "F5: Artificial Intelligence and Smart Energy".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 March 2022) | Viewed by 11648

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Faculty of Transport, Warsaw University of Technology, ul. Koszykowa 75, 00-662 Warsaw, Poland
Interests: air traffic surveillance; satellite systems; telecommunication; road traffic management; ITS
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

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Guest Editor
Faculty of Transport, Warsaw University of Technology, ul. Koszykowa 75, 00-662 Warsaw, Poland
Interests: telecommunication; intelligent transportation systems; cybersecurity; transport telematics; systems reliability

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The increase in human life expectancy is a demographic process appearing all over the world for many years. It is a socially beneficial process but incredibly challenging from the point of view of the world economy. The share of older people in society is increasing, and by 2050, it is predicted to be over 50%. Moreover, the unexpected coronavirus pandemic has shown that the ability to deliver goods is of great new importance, especially in a safe, non-contact, and sterile manner. The need to limit mobility and interpersonal relations, especially of the elderly, requires searching for new solutions that would reduce human participation in these activities to the necessary minimum. These two phenomena are a clear rationale for research and development work on the companion robot that overrides tasks to provide care services. Therefore, the actions are of no minor importance to adjusting robots to new tasks. Among them, positioning and navigation of the robot should be distinguished, including determining the permissible position error in an urbanized environment, and robot communication with the environment, with the assumed level of data transmission security.

Among the methods already considered in robot operation are positioning with a global navigation satellite system (GNSS), cell ID (E-CID) identification, time difference of arrival (TDoA) via wireless points access, and sensor-based positioning. Each of them takes into account the different tiers and the set of characteristics that user equipment may possess.

At the same time, currently, the greatest positioning range is achieved through GNSS, namely, using GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, and BeiDou systems. However, this technique does not always have an optimal performance. The problem is, for example, the multipath error in a densely urbanized area. Another limitation is that the machine or device (e.g., robot) does not provide an interface satellite connection.

As an alternative to GNSS navigation, special attention should be paid to TDoA-based techniques, which provide good accuracy both outdoors and indoors and can be used in 3D environments. As 5G grows, other new methods and techniques arise to increase the deployment possibilities of innovative positioning systems. One of these could be a technique of collecting fingerprints. This has been developed to be a three-dimensional location of objects. However, its accuracy depends on whether the environment considered during the calibration changes.

The purpose of this Special Issue is to cover issues related to navigation, positioning, and wireless communication with particular applications to companion robots, including methods and issues that may have a direct or indirect impact on the implementation of tasks by such robots, e.g., communication with road infrastructure (R2I robot-to-infrastructure), communication with pedestrians, communication interfaces, risk analysis, cybersecurity issues, and reliability aspects. Papers concerning issues related to secure information exchange as well as data quality assurance and energies aspects are also welcomed.

Dr. Karolina Krzykowska-Piotrowska
Prof. Mirosław Siergiejczyk
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • navigation
  • positioning
  • GNSS
  • GPS
  • GLONASS
  • Beidou
  • galileo
  • time difference of arrival (TDoA)
  • fingerprint
  • robot companion
  • wireless communication
  • vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I)
  • vehicle-to-pedestrian (V2P)
  • 5G
  • internet of things
  • cybersecurity
  • risk analysis
  • reliability
  • energy
  • information exchange
  • data quality
  • digitalization
  • automation
  • aging society
  • productivity

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Published Papers (5 papers)

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Editorial

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4 pages, 185 KiB  
Editorial
On the Navigation, Positioning and Wireless Communication of the Companion Robot in Outdoor Conditions
by Karolina Krzykowska-Piotrowska and Mirosław Siergiejczyk
Energies 2022, 15(14), 4936; https://doi.org/10.3390/en15144936 - 6 Jul 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1325
Abstract
The dynamic process of demographic aging is an important reason for the systematic increase in the share of people with reduced mobility in Polish society [...] Full article

Research

Jump to: Editorial

18 pages, 7403 KiB  
Article
Noises in Double-Differenced GNSS Observations
by Dominik Prochniewicz, Jacek Kudrys and Kamil Maciuk
Energies 2022, 15(5), 1668; https://doi.org/10.3390/en15051668 - 23 Feb 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2249
Abstract
Precise data processing from the Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) reference station network is mainly based on a combination of double-differenced carrier phase and code observations. This approach allows most of the measurement errors to be removed or reduced and is characterized as [...] Read more.
Precise data processing from the Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) reference station network is mainly based on a combination of double-differenced carrier phase and code observations. This approach allows most of the measurement errors to be removed or reduced and is characterized as the most accurate method. However, creating observation differences between two receivers and two satellites increases the measurement noise of the observations by a factor of 2. As a result, it increases the impact of the incorrect definition of the noise characteristic on the results of the estimation of the unknowns in the positioning model. This is especially important in Multi-GNSS solutions, which integrate measurements from different systems, for which the stochastic parameters of observation may differ significantly. In this paper, the authors prepared a complex analysis of the noise type in double-differenced GNSS (GPS, GLONASS and Galileo) observations, both carrier phase and code ones, with a 1 s sampling interval. The Autocorrelation Function (ACF) method, the Lomb–Scargle (L-S) periodogram method, and the Allan variance (AVAR) method were used. The results that were obtained for the weekly set of measurement data showed that, depending on the system and type of observation, the noise level and its type are significantly different. Among the code measurements, the lowest noise levels were obtained for the GPS C5Q and Galileo C7Q/C8Q observations, with the standard deviations not exceeding ±10 cm, while the noisiest observations were for the GLONASS C1C and C2C signals, which had standard deviations of about ±90 cm and ±45 cm, respectively. For the carrier phase observations, each signal type was characterized by very similar noise levels of ±1.5–3.5 mm. The ACF analysis showed that 1 Hz double-differenced GNSS data can only be treated as being not correlated to time for carrier phase observations; for code observations, an irrelevant autocorrelation may be considered for measurement intervals greater than 20 s. Depending on the GNSS signals, the spectral index k varies in a range from −1.3 to −0.2 for code data and k = 0.0 in the case of phase data. Using the modified Allan deviation (MDEV) allows for specific noise types for each signal and GNSS system to be determined. All of the code observations were characterized by either flicker PM or white PM. In the case of the phase observations, they were all uniquely characterized by white PM (GPS and Galileo or by white PM and flicker PM (GLONASS). Full article
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39 pages, 37460 KiB  
Article
Identification of BDS Satellite Clock Periodic Signals Based on Lomb-Scargle Power Spectrum and Continuous Wavelet Transform
by Jacek Kudrys, Dominik Prochniewicz, Fang Zhang, Mateusz Jakubiak and Kamil Maciuk
Energies 2021, 14(21), 7155; https://doi.org/10.3390/en14217155 - 1 Nov 2021
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 1828
Abstract
Onboard satellite clocks are the basis of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) operation, and their revolution periods are at the level of 2 per day (about 12 h) in the case of the Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellites. In this work, the authors [...] Read more.
Onboard satellite clocks are the basis of Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) operation, and their revolution periods are at the level of 2 per day (about 12 h) in the case of the Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellites. In this work, the authors analysed the entire BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS) space segment (BDS-2 and BDS-3) in terms of the occurrence of periodic, repetitive signals in the clock products, and checked if they coincide with the orbital periods or their multiples. The Lomb-Scargle (L-S) power spectrum was used as a tool to determine the periods present in the BDS clock products, allowing for analyses based on incomplete input data; in this case, the incomplete data were the phase data with jumps and outliers removed. In addition, continuous wavelet transform (CWT) was used to produce a time−frequency representation showing the more complex behaviour of the satellite clock products. As shown in the case of geostationary and geosynchronous inclined orbit satellites, the main period was 23.935 h, while for the Medium Earth Orbit it was 12.887 h, with the BDS satellite orbital period being 12 h 53 m (12.883 h). Some effects connected with reference clock swapping are also visible in the power spectrum. The conducted analyses showed that the BDS-2 satellite clocks have much higher noise than the BDS-3 satellite clocks, meaning that the number of designated periods is greater, but their reliability is significantly lower. BDS-3 satellites have only been in operation for a very short time, thus this is the first analysis to include this type of data. Moreover, such a wide and complex analysis has not been carried out to date. Full article
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29 pages, 6194 KiB  
Article
The Highest Peaks of the Mountains: Comparing the Use of GNSS, LiDAR Point Clouds, DTMs, Databases, Maps, and Historical Sources
by Stanisław Szombara, Marta Róg, Krystian Kozioł, Kamil Maciuk, Bogdan Skorupa, Jacek Kudrys, Tomáš Lepeška and Michal Apollo
Energies 2021, 14(18), 5731; https://doi.org/10.3390/en14185731 - 11 Sep 2021
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2577
Abstract
Advances in remote data acquisition techniques have contributed to the flooding of society with spatial data sets and information. Widely available spatial data sets, including digital terrain models (DTMs) from aerial laser scanning (ALS) data, are finding more and more new applications. The [...] Read more.
Advances in remote data acquisition techniques have contributed to the flooding of society with spatial data sets and information. Widely available spatial data sets, including digital terrain models (DTMs) from aerial laser scanning (ALS) data, are finding more and more new applications. The article analyses and compares the heights of the 14 highest peaks of the Polish Carpathians derived from different data sources. Global navigation satellite system (GNSS) geodetic measurements were used as reference. The comparison primarily involves ALS data, and selected peaks’ GNSS measurements carried out with Xiaomi Mi 8 smartphones were also compared. Recorded raw smartphone GNSS measurements were used for calculations in post-processing mode. Other data sources were, among others, global and local databases and models and topographic maps (modern and old). The article presents an in-depth comparison of Polish and Slovak point clouds for two peaks. The results indicate the possible use of large-area laser scanning in determining the maximum heights of mountain peaks and the need to use geodetic GNSS measurements for selected peaks. For the Polish peak of Rysy, the incorrect classification of point clouds causes its height to be overestimated. The conclusions presented in the article can be used in the dissemination of knowledge and to improve positioning methods. Full article
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23 pages, 1009 KiB  
Article
Is Secure Communication in the R2I (Robot-to-Infrastructure) Model Possible? Identification of Threats
by Karolina Krzykowska-Piotrowska, Ewa Dudek, Mirosław Siergiejczyk, Adam Rosiński and Wojciech Wawrzyński
Energies 2021, 14(15), 4702; https://doi.org/10.3390/en14154702 - 3 Aug 2021
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 2281
Abstract
The increase in the role of companion robots in everyday life is inevitable, and their safe communication with the infrastructure is one of the fundamental challenges faced by designers. There are many challenges in the robot’s communication with the environment, widely described in [...] Read more.
The increase in the role of companion robots in everyday life is inevitable, and their safe communication with the infrastructure is one of the fundamental challenges faced by designers. There are many challenges in the robot’s communication with the environment, widely described in the literature on the subject. The threats that scientists believe have the most significant impact on the robot’s communication include denial-of-service (DoS) attacks, satellite signal spoofing, external eavesdropping, spamming, broadcast tampering, and man-in-the-middle attacks. In this article, the authors attempted to identify communication threats in the new robot-to-infrastructure (R2I) model based on available solutions used in transport, e.g., vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I), taking into account the threats already known affecting the robot’s sensory systems. For this purpose, all threats that may occur in the robot’s communication with the environment were analyzed. Then the risk analysis was carried out, determining, in turn, the likelihood of potential threats occurrence, their consequence, and ability of detection. Finally, specific methods of responding to the occurring threats are proposed, taking into account cybersecurity aspects. A critical new approach is the proposal to use communication and protocols so far dedicated to transport (IEEE 802.11p WAVE, dedicated short-range communications (DSRC)). Then, the companion’s robot should be treated as a pedestrian and some of its sensors as an active smartphone. Full article
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