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Robotics and Beyond

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PCQ Bureau
New Update

The Hyderabad-based Robotics Research Center (RRC) is probably the only one

in the country to have a deliberate focus on the two futuristic concepts in

robotics-SLAM and Swarm robotics. Besides these, the center is also doing

extensive research on hybrid legged wheeled vehicles, and bipedal robots. Headed

by Dr. K Madhava Krishna and Dr. Bipin Indurkhya, the center also organizes

'Robotics in Education' workshops targeted at the student community ranging from

school to engineering students. High school students are even encouraged and

aided to build mini



robots using recyclable inexpensive raw materials.

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Explaining the research on SLAM, Prof. Madhava Krishna said, “SLAM stands for

Simultaneous localization and mapping. It is a technique used by robots to

create a map within an unknown environment and keeping track of their current

position at the same time. Though this might sound simple, coordination between

multiple sensors and receptors is the challenge here.”

Swarm robots

Swarm robotics, on the other hand is a new approach to the coordination of

multi-robot systems which consist a cluster of many but relatively simple

physical robots. The goal of this approach is to study the design of robots,

across two areas-physical movement and electronic controls, in order to make

them 'work' depending on your use and application. Emphasis is paid to how these

robots interact with each other. This behavioral aspect of robots is termed as

Swarm intelligence, and RRC is currently doing research on the future and

predictable behavior of multi-robot systems. Speaking about the advantages of

the Swarm system, Prof. Madhava said, “The biggest advantage here is

scalability. Local communication, which is achieved by wireless transmission

systems using radio frequency or infrared communication can be used to optimize

performance.”

K Madhava Krishna



Professor, RRC Hyderabad

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