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Programmatic/Technical Accomplishments
Automated Ground Vehicle (AGV) Demonstrates Ability to Avoid Standard Obstacles
MEL researchers demonstrated the ability of their surrogate automated guided vehicle (AGV) to safely detect and avoid the proposed standard test pieces for the U.S. American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) B56.5 - Safety Standard for Guided Industrial Vehicle and Automated Functions of Manned Industrial Vehicles). The AGV demonstrated the ability to automatically detect and avoid the proposed standard test pieces for the ASME B56 safety standard while operating on the NIST shop floor. Among other things, these test pieces are designed to represent a human form that is prone on the floor and the lower part of a human leg. The AGV used a spinning laser absolute positioning system as done in industry and a Safety 2-dimensional (2D) scanning LADAR (Laser Detection and Ranging) for obstacle detection. Through this research program, MEL/NIST is hoping to provide the guidance and expertise necessary to allow AGVs to operate amongst humans.
Contact: Stephen Balakirsky, 301 975 4791, Roger Bostelman, 301 975 3426
National Ballistics Imaging Comparison (NBIC) Project Workshop Held
Ballistic imaging has proven to be effective to criminal investigators. It gives them the ability to definitively connect recovered firearms to a particular shooting and/or crime. NIST organized a workshop on the National Ballistics Imaging Comparison (NBIC) Project on January 8th, 2009 in New Orleans, LA. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) organized the 2009 National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) Users Congress and the NBIC workshop was part of that conference. The NBIC project aims to establish a Traceability and Quality System for ballistics signature measurements in U.S. NIBIN crime labs using NIST standard reference materials (SRM) 2460 Bullets and SRM 2461 Casings as quality assurance check standards. This project was initiated at the first NBIC Workshop in June 2008 with 21 examiners from 13 ballistics laboratories participating by taking periodic image acquisitions and correlations of the NIST standard bullets and casings over the course of a year. The protocol calls for a total of about 24 ballistics signature measurements in each participating laboratory during this time period. All participants are using commercial Integrated Ballistics Identification Systems (IBIS) for image acquisition and correlation. The correlation scores will be submitted by each lab on a spreadsheet developed by NIST for statistical analyses. From this data, control chart and control limits will be developed for the proposed Nationwide Traceability and Quality System and to promote future assessments and accreditations for U.S. ballistics laboratories using the ISO 17025 Standard. At this workshop, the IBIS measurement data were summarized and problems and suggestions were discussed for improving the image acquisitions by the participants. There is approximately five month remaining on the data collection phase of this project. About 45 people participated in the workshop, which was organized by T. Vorburger, J. Song, T. Renegar and A. Zheng of MEL and R. Thompson of EEEL. The NBIC project is supported by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) through the Office of Law Enforcement Standards (OLES) at NIST.
Contact: John Song, 301 975 3799
NIST Site and Ground Truth Measurements Used Successfully for Army Autonomous Vehicle Perception Algorithm Performance Analysis
For the second time in 4 months, MEL researchers configured and operated a data collection site along NIST’s Center Drive from January 21st – 23rd, 2009, to support an exercise designed to evaluate the technical progress of the Army Research Laboratory (ARL) Robotics Collaborative Technology Alliance (CTA) members in the area of pedestrian detection. Drawing on MEL’s expertise in measuring performance of intelligent systems, MEL researchers worked with researchers from General Dynamics Robotic Systems (GDRS) and ARL personnel to collect essential ground truth data in an evaluation of pedestrian detection algorithms and sensors. The ground truth data, perception algorithm results, and the simultaneously-collected sensor data from multiple sensors (i.e., color cameras, ladars, and infrared (IR) cameras) were used to evaluate performance and to improve perception algorithms for human detection to further the goal of enhancing safe operations for autonomous vehicles around people.
The site along Center Dr. was instrumented with an ultra-wide-band (UWB) position measurement system to track moving and fixed objects in the test area of roughly 300 m by 150 m. MEL researchers also configured and operated the vehicle’s initial heading and position determination system for this exercise. The system tracked eight moving objects and the vehicle under test during three days of operation. Over the three day period, more than 60 data collection runs were performed, including formal, highly choreographed scenarios, less formal excursion runs, and several calibration runs each day. Vehicle speeds of 15 kph and 30 kph were used, as were walking and jogging speeds for pedestrians. In addition, position data was collected for numerous other objects, including crates, barrels, cones, mannequins, and other vehicles. Extensive video was also collected from the test vehicle and from various positions on the course. MEL researchers worked with GDRS researchers to ensure that sufficient backups of collected data and results were produced independently during the exercise. New to this event was the use of recently developed data visualization capabilities to provide more immediate feedback about sensor and algorithm performance during the execution of the exercise. To make these possible, MEL researchers worked with GDRS and the CTA members to define standard formats for the collected data and perception results. The value of these new capabilities was immediately recognized by ARL and GDRS. The team is proceeding with the post-processing and data analysis phase.
Contact: Harry Scott, 301 975 3437, Adam Jacoff, 301 975 4235
MEL Held “Future STEP” Workshop
MEL researchers held their first “Future STEP” workshop at the International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) meeting held January 31, 2009 in San Francisco. The workshop was extremely successful. The overarching purpose was to examine how to make STEP (ISO 10303) Product Data Representation and Exchange standard work with modern-day Web standards. The STEP standard covers computer-interpretable representation of product data, and its exchange. The workshop, chaired by MEL researcher Allison Barnard Feeney, was so well received that almost two dozen more attendees participated than had originally signed up. Participants worked on mapping blocks/ports/parts from SysML (Object Management Group’s standard for systems engineer data elements) into ISO 10303-233, STEP for systems engineering data) and identified the next priority areas and a date for the next mapping workshop in conjunction with the Washington, DC Object Management Group’s meeting. The documentation of the mapping will be written up as an annex of the SysML standard. There is an annex in SysML already that covers alignment with AP233, but is out of date. AP233 is a STEP-based data exchange standard targeted to support the needs of the systems engineering community, consistent with emerging standards in CAD, structural, electrical, engineering analysis and support domains. The NIST team will provide the documentation of the mapping, which will be published directly. This represents a very efficient path to standardization. Several workshop attendees expressed interest in getting new test cases into the NIST systems engineering Plug Fest to be held later this year.
Contact: Allison Barnard-Feeney, 301 975 3180
Recognition
MEL Research Gave Invited Presentation on Nanotechnology and Nanometrology
The International Life Sciences Institute (ILSI) invited MEL researcher Michael T. Postek to present a talk entitled: Measurement Science Addressing the Environmental Health and Safety (EH&S) Aspects of Engineered Nanomaterials “Tiny Threats.” The talk was presented during ILSI’s 2009 annual meeting held in Tucson, Arizona in January 2009. ILSI is a nonprofit, worldwide foundation that seeks to improve the well-being of the general public through the advancement of science. Its goal is to further the understanding of scientific issues relating to nutrition, food safety, toxicology, risk assessment, and the environment by bringing together scientists from academia, government, and industry.
Contact: Michael T. Postek, 301 975 2299
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