Mario Andrei Garzón Oviedo

Tracking and following pedestrian trajectories, an approach for autonomous surveillance of critical infrastructures

Purpose – This paper aims to present a system that is fully capable of addressing the issue of detection, tracking and following pedestrians, which is a very challenging task, especially when it is considered for using in large outdoors infrastructures. Three modules, detection, tracking and following, are integrated and tested over long distances in semi-structured scenarios, where static or dynamic obstacles, including other pedestrians, can be found. Design/methodology/approach – The detection is based on the probabilistic fusion of a laser scanner and a camera. The tracking module pairs observations with previously detected targets by using Kalman Filters and a Mahalanobis-distance. The following module allows to safely pursue the target by using a well-defined navigation scheme. Findings – The system can track pedestrians from static position to 3.46 m/s (running). It handles occlusions, crossings or miss-detections, keeping track of the position even if the pedestrian is only detected in 55/per cent...

QuadLab: A Project-Based Learning Toolkit for Automation and Robotics Engineering Education

It is frequently claimed that the students must have an active role in building and transforming their own knowledge, and the teachers labor is to provide the students the necessary tools in order to reach specific learning objectives, included in a course program. This paper presents an aerial robotic system as a toolkit, and proposes a series of activities focused on the learning in automation and robotics. These proposed activities have been designed based upon the project-based learning methodology, and they facilitate the achievement of the learning objectives presented by Spanish automation committee(CEA) in conjunction with The International Society of Automation (ISA) to satisfy the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) standard. The toolkit and the activities are oriented to impulse the practical teaching, giving the student additional motivation and, in consequence, improving his or her active role. Besides, the toolkit and the activities give the teacher a tool in which it is possible to assess the students learning process.