The department for Photogrammetry at the University of Bonn is part of the Institute for Geodesy and Geoinformation. Traditionally, the lab focusses on the interpretation of image data, especially the geometric reconstruction and the semantic interpretation of the observed scene. In the past, it has been involved in and has been leading different large-scale projects The department for Photogrammetry as well as PI Cyrill Stachniss are well-known for their mapping and exploration
solutions in the geodetic and robotics context.
The laboratory for Humanoid Robotics is headed by PI Maren Bennewizt since October 2014 on. The has a stong experitise in the context of humanoids, wheeled robots, localization, mapping, and navigation.
Before joining University of Bonn, PI Cyrill Stachniss was or is involved as a principal investigator in the European projects EUROPA, EUROPA2, First-MM, TAPAS, ROVINA, STAMINA and within the transregional research center on spatial cognition SFB/TR-8 funded by the DFG. PI Maren Bennewitz is involved as a principal investigator in the European projects SQUIRREL and within the transregional research center on spatial cognition SFB/TR-8 funded by the DFG as well as the cluster of excellence BrainLink-BrainTools.
RWTH is represented by the Computer Vision group headed by Prof. Dr. Bastian Leibe, which is part of the chair of Computer Science 8, Computer Graphics and Multimedia at RWTH Aachen University. The group is focusing on computer vision applications for mobile devices and robotics platforms and has gained substantial experience in visual object categorization, segmentation, tracking and in the interface between recognition and 3D reconstruction. Particular emphasis is placed on real-world applicability of the developed algorithms, which is an important prerequisite for robotics applications. The group is also involved in the FP7 EU project EUROPA (“European Robotic Pedestrian Assistant”), for which it is developing object recognition, tracking and 3D sensing capabilities for an outdoor robotic system. The team is hosted at RWTH Aachen University, which has been awarded excellence status in the German federal and state government initiative 2007, ranking it as one of the top nine universities in Germany.
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven
Short name:
KULeuven
Country:
BE
Description:
The team of Katholieke Universiteit Leuven that will work on the project is part of the Center for the Processing of Speech and Images (PSI), one of the units within the department of Electrical Engineering (ESAT). This team - VISICS (VISion for Industry, Communications and Services) - is specialized in computer vision and its applications and focuses on the subdomains of 3D acquisition and modeling, as well as on object and object class recognition. These are exactly the areas in which the ROVINA project will be active. The team has received several prizes for its work, including a David Marr award, two TechArt prizes, an EITC Technology Award and a Henri Ford prize. It has founded multiple spin-off companies: ICOS (chip inspection), Eyetronics (3D acquisition technology for the games and movie industry mainly) and recently GeoAutomation (mobile mapping, i.e. 3D measurements in cities from a moving van). At the IEEE Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition it has received the best video award for its work on the combination of 3D reconstruction and object (car) recognition in urban environments. This work again tallies well with the overall aims of ROVINA.
The team has a longstanding experience with European projects. It has been involved in several FP6 projects (NoEs Epoch and Pascal, IP Dirac, STREPs Class and Reveal-This) and FP7 projects (EUROPA, 3D-Coform). In the past the team has also coordinated several EC projects: Viva, Vanguard, Improofs, Impact. The Epoch and 3D-Coform projects have also given the group a strong background in the use of technology for Cultural Heritage, one of the main application envisaged in this project.
Sapienza University of Rome
Short name:
UNIROMA1
Country:
IT
Description:
Sapienza Università di Roma is one of the largest and oldest Universities of Italy and Europe. The Department of Computer and System Sciences “Antonio Ruberti” (DIS) (www.dis.uniroma1.it) includes about 65 faculty members (full, associate and assistant professors).
Internationally renowned research groups in computer science, system science and management science are active at DIS. Basic research is its main goal, with a strong emphasis on interdisciplinary research, on applications that stimulate basic research and on technology transfer and dissemination of results. Every year DIS publishes hundreds of papers in the foremost international journals and conference proceedings and its members appear in the program and steering committees of the most prestigious scientific events and institutions. Strong collaborations are maintained with researchers in other universities, research institutions and companies, in Italy and abroad. National and European research contracts and grants are routinely acquired by DIS, totaling about two million euros a year.
The research group involved in the project is within the Lab RoCoCo (Cooperative Cognitive Robots) that currently includes 3 permanent researchers, 1 postdoc, 3 Ph.D. students and several under graduate students. The main research activities include knowledge representation and reasoning, cognitive robotics, information fusion, multi-robot coordination, robot learning, stereo-vision, vision-based people and object tracking. Lab RoCoCo is equipped with many different mobile robots: wheeled, tracked, four legged, humanoid and UAV and with several multi-agent and multi-robot simulator systems. It also hosts the development of the teams of soccer and rescue robots (SPQR) participating at the RoboCup scientific competitions.
Algorithmica S.r.l.
Short name:
ALG
Country:
IT
Description:
Algorithmica Srl (ALG) is an Italian start-up company that was founded in 2008 with the objective of producing innovative technology in several domains related to artificial intelligence and field robotics. ALG is composed of a group of young computer engineers with a strong background in research and industry. As such, technology transfer is a primary activity in ALG and can rely on a united, yet heterogeneous, team of engineers that for various reasons have a long experience in building complex robotic systems together. ALG is organized in two main divisions, namely the Software House and the Research and Development (R&D). These two divisions synergistically operate for developing products and services beyond the state of the art.
The main activities of the R&D include research and development of software prototypes that implement research level technology. The research activities are aimed at overcoming the technological limitations encountered by the Software House when attempting to satisfy user needs. The R&D produces experimental prototypes implementing and benchmarking the most promising research technology.
ALG personnel has participated in the past in many research projects in the field of robotics and has a broad expertise in a number of related topics, including Benchmarking and Evaluation of robotic systems, MRS, Navigation and Robot Plan Representation and Execution. The focus of their research has been on experimental systems, that where evaluated against the state of the art in international competitions, such as RoboCup. Overall, their research resulted in over 50 peer reviewed scientific publications and the systems they developed collected various awards, including the First Prize and three third places at RoboCup Rescue Virtual Robot League, a third place at the RoboCup@Home competition in 2006, a Best Robotic Demo Award at the International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent System and a Best Paper Award at the RoboCup Symposium. For what concerns the specific tasks of this project, ALG's team members can leverage on a specific expertise on HRI, 3D graphics and online applications.
International Council on Monuments and Sites
Short name:
ICOMOS-IT
Country:
IT
Description:
The International Council on Monuments and Sites is an association of professionals that currently brings together approximately 9,500 members throughout the world. ICMS works for the conservation and pro- tection of cultural heritage places. It is the only global non-government organisation of this kind, which is dedicated to promoting the application of theory, methodology and scientific techniques to the conservation of the architectural and archeological heritage. Its work is based on the principles enshrined in the 1964 In- ternational Charter on the Conservation and Restoration of Monuments and Sites (the Venice Charter). ICMS is a network of experts that benefits from the interdisciplinary exchange of its members, among which are ar- chitects, historians, archeologists, art historians, geographers, anthropologists, engineers and town planners. The members of ICMS contribute to improving the preservation of heritage, the standards and the techniques for each type of cultural heritage property: buildings, historic cities, cultural landscapes and archeological sites. The purpose of ICMS involvement with the World Heritage Convention is provision of the highest available degree of professional expertise in the evaluation of World Heritage nominations and other aspects of implementation of the World Heritage Convention. Experts in the ICMS World Heritage system include all persons involved in the process of evaluation of nominations, state of conservation reports, reactive monitoring and other missions and programmes, including amongst other experts consulted by ICMS, its World Heritage Panel, experts presenting nominations and the state of conservation reports to the Panel and World Heritage Committee, those conducting evaluation missions and other officers of the organisation.
Albert Ludwigs Universität Freiburg
Short name:
ALU-FR
Country:
DE
Description:
The Autonomous Intelligent Systems (AIS) lab and the Humanoid Robots Lab (HRL) of the University of Freiburg are concerned with techniques for autonomous navigation, state estimation and motion control in the context of wheeled, aerial, and humanoid robotics. One of the major research areas covered by the labs are mobile robot navigation and in the past, members of the labs have contributed several innovative algorithms for this area. This includes techniques for autonomous exploration, learning two- and three-dimensional maps, vision-based localization, outdoor-navigation with rovers and mapping with helicopters and the deployment of interactive robots in trade shows and museums. The team at ALU-FR has around 30 members. It participates in various national and international projects including a transregional research center on spatial cognition and a research training group on embedded microsystems, as well as several European Projects and collaborates with numerous universities in Germany, Europe and the USA. ALU-FR will bring in its internationally renowned experts in robotics as well as results of several years of research in navigation.
ALU-FR carries out or has completed the following projects. The European Projects: CoSy, muFly, INDIGO, WebFAIR, TOURBOT, RAWSEEDS, EUROPA, First-MM, TAPAS, RADHAR; the DFG projects: SFB/TR-8 research center on spatial cognition, research training group on embedded microsystems; and the nationally funded BMBF project German Service Robotics Initiative - DESIRE as well as several industrially funded projects. Furthermore, the AIS lab was and is currently coordinating the FP7 project EUROPA and First-MM.