Publications

Journal

May 2020

From Design to Deployment: Decentralized Coordination of Heterogeneous Robotic Teams

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Frontiers in Robotics and AI

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Journal

December 2019

SOUL: data sharing for robot swarms

David St-Onge, MIST Lab

Autonomous Robots

Journal

December 2019

Collective expression: how robotic swarms convey information with group motion

David St-Onge, MIST Lab, Laboratoire Cognitions Humaine et Artificielle

Paladyn, Journal of Behavioral Robotics

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Journal

December 2019

Planetary exploration with robot teams: Implementing Higher Autonomy With Swarm Intelligence

David St-Onge, MIST Lab, Coffey Lab: audition, sleep & plasticity

IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine

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Conférence

October 2019

New Delhi, India

Towards situational awareness from robotic group motion

David St-Onge, MIST Lab, Laboratoire Cognitions Humaine et Artificielle

IEEE International Conference on Robot & Human Interactive Communication

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Journal

August 2019

Decentralized progressive shape formation with robot swarms

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David St-Onge, MIST Lab

Autonomous Robots

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Journal

June 2019

Engaging with robotic swarms: commands from expressive motion

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David St-Onge, MIST Lab, Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Rhythm, Time and Motion

ACM Transactions on Human-Robot Interaction

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Conférence

May 2019

Montréal, Canada

Clothes design using micro-UAVs

David St-Onge, Ying Gao, MIST Lab

ICRA-X: Robotic Art Program : Forum “Expressive Motions”

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Conférence

May 2019

Montréal

Decentralized collaborative transport of fabrics using micro-UAVs

David St-Onge, MIST Lab

IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)

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Conférence

May 2019

Montréal, Canada

Tangible robotic fleet control

David St-Onge, MIST Lab

International Conference on Autonomous Agents and MultiAgent Systems

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Conférence

May 2019

Montréal, Canada

Collaborative tracking of devices in historical architecture

David St-Onge, MIST Lab

Colloque annuel ReSMiQ

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October 2018

Madrid, Spain

Lightweight collision avoidance for resource-constrained robots

David St-Onge, MIST Lab

IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems

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Journal

March 2018

A deployable mechanism concept for the collection of small-to-medium-size space debris

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@article{St-Onge2018,
abstract = {Current efforts in active debris removal strategies and mission planning focus on removing the largest, most massive debris. It can be argued, however, that small untrackable debris, specifically those smaller than 5 cm in size, also pose a serious threat. In this work, we propose and analyze a mission to sweep the most crowded Low Earth Orbit with a large cupola device to remove small-to-medium-size debris. The cupola consists of a deployable mechanism expanding more than 25 times its storage size to extend a membrane covering its surface. The membrane is sufficiently stiff to capture most small debris and to slow down the medium-size objects, thus accelerating their fall. An overview of the design of a belt-driven rigid-link mechanism proposed to support the collecting cupola surface is presented, based on our previous work. Because of its large size, the cupola will be subject to significant aerodynamic drag; thus, orbit maintenance analysis is carried out using the DTM-2013 atmospheric density model and it predicts feasible requirements. While in operation, the device will also be subject to numerous hyper-velocity impacts which may significantly perturb its orientation from the desired attitude for debris collection. Thus, another important feature of the proposed debris removal device is a distributed array of flywheels mounted on the cupola for reorienting and stabilizing its attitude during the mission. Analysis using a stochastic modeling framework for hyper-velocity impacts demonstrates that three-axes attitude stabilization is achievable with the flywheels array. MASTER-2009 software is employed to provide relevant data for all debris related estimates, including the debris fluxes for the baseline mission design and for assessment of its expected performance. Space debris removal is a high priority for ensuring sustainability of space and continual launch and operation of man-made space assets. This manuscript presents the first analysis of a small-to-medium size debris removal mission, albeit finding it to not be economically viable at the present time.},
author = {St-Onge, David and Sharf, Inna and Sagni{\`{e}}res, Luc and Gosselin, Cl{\'{e}}ment},
doi = {10.1016/j.asr.2017.12.026},
file = {:C$\backslash$:/Users/dastonge/Desktop/Literature/St-Onge et al. - 2018 - A deployable mechanism concept for the collection of small-to-medium-size space debris.pdf:pdf},
issn = {18791948},
journal = {Advances in Space Research},
keywords = {Active debris removal,Cupola device,Deployable mechanism,Small size,Space debris},
number = {5},
pages = {1286--1297},
title = {{A deployable mechanism concept for the collection of small-to-medium-size space debris}},
url = {http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S027311771730902X},
volume = {61},
year = {2018}
}

David St-Onge, McGill Aerospace Mechatronics Lab

Advances in Space Research

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Journal

January 2018

Over-the-air updates for robotic swarms

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@article{Varadharajan2018,
abstract = {Along with the growing number of robotic devices introduced by automation and the Internet of Things has come the growth of interest in methods and tools for deploying code updates to active sensor arrays and swarms of robots. This article presents a toolset that can perform an over-the-air code update of the robots in a swarm while the swarm is active, without interrupting the swarm's mission. Each update is generated as a patch of the currently deployed code. A consensus mechanism borrowed from swarm intelligence ensures that, at any given time, all robots in the swarm run the same code version. Simulations were conducted with thousands of units to study the scalability and bandwidth consumption of the update process. Real deployment experiments were then performed on a small swarm of commercial quadcopters. This article is part of a theme issue on release engineering. {\textcopyright} 1984-2012 IEEE.},
author = {Varadharajan, Vivek Shankar and Onge, David St and Gub, Christian and Beltrame, Giovanni},
doi = {10.1109/MS.2018.111095718},
file = {:C$\backslash$:/Users/dastonge/Desktop/Literature/Varadharajan et al. - 2018 - Over-the-air updates for robotic swarms.pdf:pdf},
issn = {07407459},
journal = {IEEE Software},
keywords = {AI,OTA,UAVs,artificial intelligence,autonomous vehicles,computers and society,distributed applications,distributed artificial intelligence,distributed systems,information technology,multiagent systems,over-the-air,robotics,software development,software engineering,unmanned aerial vehicles},
number = {2},
pages = {44--50},
title = {{Over-the-air updates for robotic swarms}},
volume = {35},
year = {2018}
}

David St-Onge, MIST Lab

IEEE Software

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Journal

October 2017

Montréal

Control, localization and human interaction with an autonomous lighter-than-air performer

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@article{St-Onge2016b,
abstract = {Due to the recent technological progress, Human–RobotInteraction (HRI) has become a major field of research in both engineering and artistic realms, particularly so in the last decade. The mainstream interests are, however, extremely diverse: challenges are continuously shifting, the evolution of robot' skills, as well as the advances in methods for understanding their environment radically impact the design and implementation of research prototypes. When directly deployed in a public installation or artistic performances, robots help foster the next level of understanding in HRI. To this effect, this paper presents a successful interdisciplinary art-science-technology project, the Aerostabiles, leading to a new way of conducting HRI research. The project consists of developing a mechatronic, intelligent platform embodied in multiple geometric blimps – cubes – that hover and move in the air. The artistic context of this project required a number of advances in engineering on the aspects of localization and control systems, flight dynamics, as well as interaction strategies, and their evolution through periods of collective activities called “research–creation residencies”. These events involve artists, engineers, and performers working in close collaboration, sometimes, over several weeks at a time. They generate fruitful exchanges between all researchers, but most of all, they present a unique and creative way to direct and focus the robotics development. This paper represents an overview of the technical contributions from a range of expertise through the artistic drive of the Aerostabiles project.},
author = {St-Onge, David and Br{\`{e}}ches, Pierre Yves and Sharf, Inna and Reeves, Nicolas and Rekleitis, Ioannis and Abouzakhm, Patrick and Girdhar, Yogesh and Harmat, Adam and Dudek, Gregory and Gigu{\`{e}}re, Philippe},
doi = {10.1016/j.robot.2016.10.013},
issn = {09218890},
journal = {Robotics and Autonomous Systems},
keywords = {Airship,Dynamic modeling,Human–robot interaction,Mobile robotics,Robotic art,Robotic blimp,Theater},
pages = {165--186},
publisher = {Elsevier B.V.},
title = {{Control, localization and human interaction with an autonomous lighter-than-air performer}},
url = {http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921889016306674},
volume = {88},
year = {2017}
}

David St-Onge, NXI Gestatio, McGill Aerospace Mechatronics Lab

Robotics and Autonomous Systems

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Conférence

September 2017

Vancouver, Canada

Swarming in ROS : from design to practical deployment

MIST Lab, David St-Onge

IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems

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Conférence

May 2017

Milan, Italy

ORIGIN POINT : Harmonic echoes of a stone cosmology

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David St-Onge, NXI Gestatio

Generative Art Conference

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Conférence

May 2016

Montréal, Canada

Dynamic modelling of a four-bar free floating mechanism with passive joints and flywheel actuators

David St-Onge

Joint International Conference on Multibody System Dynamics

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Journal

April 2016

Synthesis and design of a one degree-of-freedom planar deployable mechanism with a large expansion ratio

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@article{St-Onge2016a,
abstract = {This paper presents a new design of a deployable one degree-of-freedom (DOF) mechanism. Polygonal rigid-link designs are first investigated. Then, belt-driven links are considered in order to maximize the expansion ratio while avoiding flattened ill-conditioned parallelogram configurations. The planar basic shape of the proposed design is a triangle. Hence, virtually any planar or spatial surface can be created by assembling such faces. For architecture and telescopic applications, the cupola assembly is investigated. The advantages of this approach are discussed, and the scalability is demonstrated. Finally, a prototype is built for illustration purposes.},
author = {St-Onge, David and Gosselin, Cl{\'{e}}ment},
doi = {10.1115/1.4032101},
issn = {1942-4302},
journal = {Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics},
number = {2},
pages = {021025},
title = {{Synthesis and Design of a One Degree-of-Freedom Planar Deployable Mechanism With a Large Expansion Ratio}},
url = {http://mechanismsrobotics.asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/article.aspx?doi=10.1115/1.4032101},
volume = {8},
year = {2016}
}

David St-Onge

Journal of Mechanisms and Robotics

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Journal

September 2015

Dynamic modelling and control of a cubic flying blimp using external motion capture

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@article{St-Onge2015,
abstract = {This article presents results on the dynamic modelling of a cubic flying robot referred to as the Tryphon. Four identical prototypes of the Tryphon are currently available, in addition to numerous earlier prototypes. They are used for artistic performances in museums, art galleries or theatres. Unique in the airship realm, the Tryphons are difficult to control because of the limited knowledge of their behaviour. Hence, the development of a dynamic model has the potential to significantly improve the control performances. In this article, a previously proposed model is shown to adapt to the experimental data obtained from a motion capture system. Experiments with this system also lead to a simple closed-loop control of the blimp. From the data sets, a more accurate nonlinear auto-regressive with exogenous input model is developed. Furthermore, controllability issues and applications are also discussed.},
author = {St-Onge, David and Gosselin, Cl{\'{e}}ment and Reeves, Nicolas},
doi = {10.1177/0959651815597603},
isbn = {0959651815597},
issn = {20413041},
journal = {Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. Part I: Journal of Systems and Control Engineering},
keywords = {Art,airship,blimp,dynamics,mechatronics},
number = {10},
pages = {970--982},
title = {{Dynamic modelling and control of a cubic flying blimp using external motion capture}},
url = {http://pii.sagepub.com/lookup/doi/10.1177/0959651815597603},
volume = {229},
year = {2015}
}

David St-Onge, NXI Gestatio

Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. Part I: Journal of Systems and Control Engineering

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Conférence