Author: Gökhan Alcan
Safe Model Predictive Control
Safe Model Predictive Control (Safe MPC) aims to ensure that a physical system’s safety constraints are satisfied with high probability. Our research is on extending constrained MPC methods to cope with probabilistic safety constraints. We further research modeling uncertainty of dynamics to ensure safe exploration when combined with safety constraints learned in simulation, and learning powerful data-efficient surrogate models for complex dynamics.
Assignment on “Differential Dynamic Programming with Safety Constraints”
The goal of this assignment is to understand the constrained DDP with safety precautions and implement it on a real robot, e.g., Turtlebot 3 Waffle Pi. It is expected to perform the experiments in an engineered environment in which the positions of the robot and the obstacles will be measured by an external vision based system (motion capture system).
Master Thesis on “Constrained Differential Dynamic Programming”
In this thesis, an extensive investigation of constrained DDP methods will be performed and the major selected ones will be implemented in simulation environment for trajectory optimizations of different robots such as a simple point robot, 2D car-like robot, 3D quadrotor robot and cart-pole system. In this context, the methods will be compared in terms of convergence speed, computational complexity, sensitivity to initializations and parameter selections.
Master Thesis on “Dynamic Cloth Manipulation Using Reinforcement Learning”
The goal of this thesis is to develop reinforcement learning-based approaches for dynamic cloth manipulation. In this context, the thesis is expected to include high-fidelity cloth simulations, training of an agent in that simulation environment to perform dynamic manipulation tasks, and transferring the learned policies to a real robot in testing its generalization capabilities with different sizes of clothes.
Master Thesis on “Trajectory Planning and Tracking for Autonomous Vehicles Using Model Predictive Control Incorporating Vehicle Dynamics”
In this thesis, an MPC based trajectory planning and tracking method will be developed for an autonomous vehicle in simulation. A high fidelity driving simulator will be employed to incorporate vehicle dynamics in MPC constraints. The developed control must guarantee collision-free, comfortable and efficient driving performance in complex urban driving environment.
Data Driven Nonlinear Dynamic Models for Predicting Heavy-Duty Diesel Engine Torque and Combustion Emissions
Robotic Seminar Series – 21st February 2020. Speaker: Gökhan Alcan.
Robot Control
Robotic tasks in real-world applications generally involve uncertain, stochastic and dynamic environments. Pre-programming based solutions either do not work or give unsatisfactory results in such environments. This requires to generate cautious control strategies that provide optimum actions to perform the desired task while considering the effects of the uncertainties in the environment. Robot control aims […]