A free-moving transport carriage for conveying at least one workpiece, having, in addition to a control unit, a near-field sensor arrangement which can be coupled to a track control unit, wherein the track control unit is able to determine, by means of position raw information which can be determined by the near-field sensor arrangement, a relative position of one or more points of the free-moving transport carriage with regard to one or more position information sources of a near-field travelling environment. The main orientation of the transport carriage and the variable conveying direction can be coordinated to one another by the track control unit. A conveying system for conveying at least one workpiece with at least one such free-moving transport carriage, a treatment system, a treatment system having such a conveying system and a method carried out by a track control unit.

Autonomous excavator has developed rapidly in recent years because of a shortage of labor and hazardous working environments for operating excavators. Presented herein are embodiments of a novel hierarchical planning system for autonomous machines, such as excavators. In one or more embodiments, the overall planning system comprises a high-level task planner for task division and base movement planning, and general sub-task planners with motion primitives, which include both arm and base movement in the case of an excavator. Using embodiments of the system architecture, experiments were performed for the trench and pile removal tasks in the real world and for the large-scale material loading tasks in a simulation environment. The results show that the system architecture embodiments and planner method embodiments generate effective task and motion plans that perform well in autonomous excavation.

A conveyance robot includes a main body at which a conveyed object can be placed; a driving wheel provided at the main body; a memory; and a processor coupled to the memory. The processor is configured to control the driving wheel such that a progress direction of the conveyance robot is configured to match an extension direction of a running path guide portion, the running path guide portion extending along a running path that is along a wall face of a wall disposed in a building.

A relative position calculator calculates relative position and attitude of a vehicle based on images captured by an image capturing apparatus on the vehicle. An absolute position calculator extracts a marker from an image captured by the image capturing apparatus, and calculates absolute position and attitude of the vehicle, based on position and attitude of the one extracted marker. A corrector calculates the corrected position and attitude, not using the absolute position and attitude calculated based on the position and attitude of the marker when a difference or ratio of an apparent height and width of the marker in the image is equal to or smaller than a threshold, but using the absolute position and attitude calculated based on the position and attitude of the marker when the difference or ratio is larger than the threshold.

This disclosure is generally directed to generating travel route information that is interpretable by a delivery robot for traversing a last mile of a delivery. In an example embodiment, an individual captures a video clip while moving along a travel route that is preferred by the individual for use by the delivery robot. The video clip is converted into a digital route map that the delivery robot uses to reach a package drop-off location on the property. In another example embodiment, an individual captures an image of a portion of the property and appends oral instructions to reach the package drop-off location. The image and the oral instructions are converted into a digital route map for use by the delivery robot. In yet another example embodiment, markers affixed to a surface of a traversable area on the property are used by the delivery robot to reach the package drop-off location.

An optical beacon may include a housing, an optical emitter at least partially disposed within the housing, and an optical identifier generator optically coupled to the optical emitter. Light incident on the optical identifier generator may be shaped into at least one optical identifier. The optical identifier may be associated with an action capable of being carried out by a robotic cleaner such that detection of the optical identifier by the robotic cleaner causes the robotic cleaner to carry out the action.

A parking guidance system includes a parking guidance device that sets a position of a parking area in a distribution hub and generates a travel path to the parking area and an autonomous vehicle that controls movement of the autonomous vehicle to the position of the parking area set by the parking guidance device.

An image processing device includes: a first scan of first area of an image acquired on the basis of reflective light of light emitted to the outside of a mobile body in first direction; a first determination of whether or not a first condition is satisfied on the basis of result by the first scan; a second scan of second area of the image in second direction different from the first direction in a case in which the first determination determines that the first condition is satisfied; a second determination of whether or not a second condition is satisfied on the basis of result by the second scan; a third scan of third area of the image after the second determination determines that the second condition is satisfied; and a third determination of whether or not predetermined information is included in the third area scanned by the third scan.

Disclosed are techniques for navigating a mobile machine, such as an autonomous robot, in an environment that includes objects that may block, reflect, or distort satellite signals to be used for positioning. Satellite data may be captured from one or more satellites. An image may be captured using an imaging device that is at least partially oriented toward the one or more satellites. A set of sky scores may be calculated for a set of ground positions surrounding the mobile machine based on the satellite data and the image. Each of the set of sky scores may be indicative of an accuracy of a satellite-based position at one of the set of ground positions. The mobile machine's navigation may be modified using the set of sky scores.

Implementations set forth herein relate to using fiducial markings on one or more localized portions of an agricultural apparatus in order to generate local and regional data that can be correlated for planning and executing agricultural maintenance. An array of fiducial markings can be disposed onto plastic mulch that surrounds individual crops, in order that each fiducial marking of the array can operate as a signature for each individual crop. Crop data, such as health and yield, corresponding to a particular crop can then be stored in association with a corresponding fiducial marking, thereby allowing the certain data for the particular crop to be tracked and analyzed. Furthermore, autonomous agricultural devices can rely on the crop data, over other sources of data, such as GPS satellites, thereby allowing the autonomous agricultural devices to be more reliable.