ASNE Day 2016 - Technical Paper Session 2 : Wednesday, March 2, 2016 1600-1730
Unmanned and Cyber
Authors: Christopher Reid, Biswanath Samanta, and Christopher Kadlec
Title: Heterogeneous Networked Systems in a ROS-Enabled Cloud Environment
Abstract:
It is important in the development of cloud based autonomous systems that the challenges presented by transferring computational loads to networked resources are properly addressed. The challenges include network latency, data integrity, security, and privacy. The objective of the present work is to investigate the issues of latency and data integrity in a representative cloud robotics environment. The present work involves setting up a cloud robotics network in an open- source Robot Operating System (ROS) framework and carrying out investigations on the levels of latency and reduction in data integrity as utilization of the network increases. In this study, a virtual datacenter has been set up to provide the foundation on which to build software systems to provide cloud services. Robot Operating System (ROS) framework has been used to facilitate communication among heterogeneous systems in the network. Three types of robots, including the Parrot AR.Drone2.0, the KobukiTurtlebot 2, and the LEGO EV3 have been implemented in the system. The system has been tested for baseline connectivity and under low- and high-bandwidth conditions to determine the latency and data integrity of the network connections. Additionally, a heterogeneous system consisting of sensor feedback from the AR.Drone2.0 and motor control of the Turtlebot 2 has been built to examine the connection between the devices themselves. Through this study, it has been demonstrated that under low-bandwidth conditions, the network performs reasonably well in the areas of latency and data integrity. However, for high-bandwidth conditions involving image transmission, the network performance deteriorates considerably, both in terms of latency and data integrity. One possible reason is the wireless router used in the current setup. It is also recommended that, especially under high-bandwidth loads, it is necessary for networked systems to perform some portion of their computations on-board and high-bandwidth wireless connectivity to the cloud is facilitated. Ongoing research and future directions are also outlined.
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