L'évolution autonome d'un robot dans un environnement évolutif nécessite qu'il soit doté de capacités de perception, d'action et de décision suffisantes pour réaliser la tâche assignée. Une tâche essentielle en robotique est la manipulation d'objets et d'outils. Elle intervient non seulement pour un robot seul mais également dans des situations d'interaction avec un humain ou un autre robot quand il s'agit d'échanger des objets ou de les manipuler conjointement. Cette thèse porte sur la planification de tâches de manipulation d'objets pour un robot autonome dans un environnement humain. Une architecture logicielle susceptible de résoudre ce type de problèmes au niveau géométrique est proposée. Généralement, une tâche de manipulation commence par une opération de saisie dont la qualité conditionne fortement la réussite de la tâche et pour laquelle nous proposons un planificateur basé sur les propriétés inertielles de l'objet et une décomposition en éléments quasi-convexes tout en prenant en compte les contraintes imposées par le système mobile complet dans un environnement donné. Les résultats sont validés en simulation et sur le robot sur la base d'une extension des outils de planification développés au LAAS-CNRS. Le modèle géométrique 3D de l'objet peut être connu a priori ou bien acquis en ligne. Des expérimentations menées sur un robot manipulateur mobile équipé d'une pince à trois points de contacts, de capteurs de force et d'une paire de caméras stéréoscopiques ont montré la validité de l'approche.

Fakes als mediale Produkte, auch „Borderline-Journalismus“ genannt, bezeichnen das Phänomen des vorsätzlich fälschenden Journalismus. Hierzu zählen die seinerzeit gefälschten Hitler-Tagebücher (stern),erfundene Interviews mit Hollywoodstars (u.a. SZ-Magazin) oder gefälschte TV-Reportagen (stern-tv). Weitere Felder sind manipulativer Fotojournalismus und in bestimmter Weise auch die Szene der „Webblogger“. „Medienethik“ hat daher nicht nur die Funktion, sozio-moralische Diskurse zu führen, sondern auch in einer möglichst öffentlichen Diskussion bedenklich erscheinende Geschehnisse explizit im Medienkontext aufzuarbeiten und zu analysieren. Ihr kommt so besonders die Funktion einer Berufsregeloder Standesethik zu. Es werden zwei Fallbeispiele (Tom Kummers „Starinterviews“, Janet Cookes „Jimmy’s World“) diskutiert. / Phony media products, also known as „borderline-journalism“, mark the phenomenon of the intentional faking journalism. Among those occur the faked Adolf-Hitler-Diaries (stern-magazine), the fabulous Hollywood star-interviews (Süddeutsche Zeitung-Magazine) or faked tv-reports (stern-tv). Further facets are manipulated photojournalism products and in special relation the „webblogger-scene“. „Mediaethics“ therefore is more than social-moralistic discussion. At least in public discourses (in the public about media, but especially in the media about themselves) they have carefully to locate and analyze dubious media contents, fulfilling their role as watchdog and professional caring instance. Referring to German and American fake journalists and their products in this essay two examples are shown.

Mémoire de DEA--Histoire--Institut d'études politiques de Paris, 2002. / Bibliogr. p. 191-195.

The wheelchair-mounted robotic arm (WMRA) is a 9-degree of freedom (DoF) assistive system that consists of a 2-DoF modified commercial power wheelchair and a custom 7-DoF robotic arm. Kinematics and control methodology for the 9-DoF system that combine mobility and manipulation have been previously developed and implemented. This combined control allows the wheelchair and robotic arm to follow a single trajectory based on weighted optimizations. However, for the execution of activities of daily living (ADL) in the real-world environment, modified control techniques have been implemented. In order to execute macro ADL tasks, such as a "go to and pick up" task, this work has implemented several control algorithms on the WMRA system. Visual servoing based on template matching and feature extraction allows the mobile platform to approach the desired goal object. Feature extraction based on scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) gives the system object detection capabilities to recommend actions to the user and to orient the arm to grasp the goal object using visual servoing. Finally, a collision avoidance system is implemented to detect and avoid obstacles when the wheelchair platform is moving towards the goal object. These implementations allow the WMRA system to operate autonomously from the beginning of the task where the user selects the goal object, all the way to the end of the task where the task has been fully completed.

Social aggression -- the use of covert forms of aggression such as betrayal, gossip, and rumor-spreading -- has only recently been the focus of research and is not yet well understood. This study hypothesizes that the tactics of socially aggressive children are consistent with the social manipulations of Machiavelli. Niccolo Machiaveli wrote extensively on the coercive techniques he used to gain power, achieve his goals, and defend his country (e.g. Machiavelli, 1513/1968). Christie and Geis (1970), inspired by Machiaveli, began researching a form of social manipulation that they term Machiavellianism. While the similarities in characteristics of Machiavellian and socially aggressive children seem to indicate that they may share behavioral strategies and social goals, there is no research to date that compares these children. Additionally, since little research has examined the goals of social aggression in relational conflict situations this study used a quantitative measure of social goals in order to better understand the purpose of a child's behavior. / text

Nuclear magnetic resonance force microscopy (NMRFM) of a micron size sample of ammonium sulfate was performed by measuring the cantilever deflection produced by coupling the magnetic force to a mechanical cantilever at its resonance frequency. Spin-lattice and spin-spin relaxation measurements were obtained with our newly developed NMRFM probe. A system with more advanced positioning, acquisition and analysis has been fabricated. A new device in which a semi-automatic system performs nanoposition control, spin manipulation, dynamical measurements, and data analysis has been demonstrated to be successful. The new system has proven to be an improvement with respect to other versions of NMRFM probes, thanks to its versatility for pulse sequence designs, faster data acquisition, and automatic analysis of the information. This thesis presents an explanation of the theoretical details of nuclear magnetic resonance force microscopy, and experiments are described in which dynamical measurements of proton spin interactions are obtained. Finally, relaxation time e ffects of the observed force signal are considered in detail. A novel spin manipulation technique which is being implemented for future measurements is described in detail, and magnet con figurations for larger magnetic field gradients and consequently larger signal-to-noise ratio, are also described. / text

Human-robot interaction (HRI) is the future of robotics. It is essential in the expanding markets, such as surgical, medical, and therapy robots. However, existing industrial systems can also benefit from safe and effective HRI. Many robots are now being fitted with joint torque sensors to enable effective human-robot collision detection. Many existing and off-the-shelf industrial robotic systems are not equipped with these sensors. This work presents and demonstrates a method for effective collision detection on a system with motor current feedback instead of joint torque sensors. The effectiveness of this system is also evaluated by simulating collisions with human hands and arms. Joint torques are estimated from the input motor currents. The joint friction and hysteresis losses are estimated for each joint of an SIA5D 7 Degree of Freedom (DOF) manipulator. The estimated joint torques are validated by comparing to joint torques predicted by the recursive application of Newton-Euler equations. During a pick and place motion, the estimation error in joint 2 is less than 10 Newton meters. Acceleration increased the estimation uncertainty resulting in estimation errors of 20 Newton meters over the entire workspace. When the manipulator makes contact with the environment or a human, the same technique can be used to estimate contact torques from motor current. Current-estimated contact torque is validated against the calculated torque due to a measured force. The error in contact force is less than 10 Newtons. Collision detection is demonstrated on the SIA5D using estimated joint torques. The effectiveness of the collision detection is explored through simulated collisions with the human hands and arms. Simulated collisions are performed both for a typical pick and place motion as well as trajectories that transverse the entire workspace. The simulated forces and pressures are compared to acceptable maximums for human hands and arms. During pick and place motions with vertical and lateral end effector motions at 10mm/s and 25mm/s, the maximum forces and pressures remained below acceptable levels. At and near singular configurations some collisions can be difficult to detect. Fortunately, these configurations are generally avoided for kinematic reasons. / text

Many of the first robots ever built, decades even before the first industrial robots, were humanoids. It seems like researchers have always sought to imitate the human form with their robots, and with good reason. Humans are incredibly flexible; they can perform a huge variety of tasks, from locomotion over rough terrain, to delicate assembly, to heavy lifting. A human’s second arm allows him to lift twice as much weight. His workspace is approximately doubled, and he can perform a broader variety of tasks as items are passed back and forth between hands. We sought to impart some of that same functionality to a strong, rigid, dual-arm robot. Specifically, we developed a control law that allows two robot arms to lift and manipulate an object in cooperation. As opposed to the prior art, our control law is tailored for industrial robots. These robots do not usually allow torque control and their control frequency is generally 60 Hz. Through the use of fuzzy logic, the control law is quite robust at 60 Hz control rates. Its simple structure reduces the computational cost of the algorithm by approximately 75% over Jacobian-based methods. Stability is proven and the controller parameters can be adjusted to handle perturbances of arbitrary magnitude. Since the robots behave as an admittance, torque control is not required. Several experiments were conducted to benchmark and validate the performance of this control law. The controller is able to maintain a clamp force within ± 4N despite a wide variation in trajectory and control frequency. This fine level of force control makes the controller suitable for delicate tasks. The conclusion suggests several extensions that would make this control law more useful. For example, adaptive control would improve the performance. A position feedback controller should be cascaded so that the robot arms’ tracking accuracy is improved. Many tasks (such as co-robotics) require external compliance, and we show how external compliance could easily be incorporated. / text

Etik kring bilder i annonser har diskuterats mycket, speciellt modell-, ochproduktbilder har kritiserats. Det tycks dock saknas forskning om acceptanskring efterbehandling av landskapsfotografier som ofta används vidmarknadsföring av turistmål. En webbenkätundersökning genomfördes medbildexempel för att undersöka vilken nivå av efterbehandling som ansågsverklighetstrogen, tilltalande och accepterbar i sådana annonser. Slutsatsenblev att fotografier där exponeringen korrigerats för att skapa en tydligare bildvar det mest accepterade. Skillnader i åsikter mellan åldrar, kön, de som haroch inte har tidigare erfarenhet av fotografi och retuschering diskuterades ochdet visade sig att kvinnor och de utan tidigare erfarenhet var lite mer kritiskatill efterbehandling. Det framkom att en del betraktare kan accepteraytterligare efterbehandling om den genomförs för att sälja en specifik känslaoch så länge inte betraktaren kan känna sig vilseledd. / The ethics on pictures in advertising have been widely discussed, especiallymodel, and product photographs have been criticized. There seems to be ashortage of research on acceptance of image processing of landscapephotographs that are often used in advertisements for tourist destinations. Aweb survey with example pictures was conducted to examine what level ofimage processing was deemed life like, appealing and acceptable in those kindsof advertisements. The conclusion was that photographs where the exposurehad been corrected to create a clearer picture was the most acceptable.Differences in opinions between ages, genders and those with or withoutprevious experience about image processing were discussed and it showedthat women were slightly more critical to image processing. Those withprevious experience were generally more okay with image processing. Someviewers accept further processing if it is done to sell a specific feeling and doesnot make the viewer feel mislead.

While the effect of auditor industry specialization is well documented in prior literature, it is unclear under what conditions or for which type of firms an auditor's industry expertise matters. I hypothesize that industry specialist auditors will provide higher quality audits in settings where the likelihood of revenue manipulation is greater. I use a firm's manipulation of revenues to measure audit quality because the revenue account is significant, requires in-depth industry specific knowledge, and is subject to frequent manipulation. The results suggest that the impact of industry specialists is concentrated among firms with complex revenue recognition standards, high growth, and low institutional monitoring. Overall, my findings highlight the importance for regulators, auditors, clients, and investors to consider the circumstances in which industry expertise improves the quality of an audit.