Grant: Strategic Network Grants Program

The NSERC Field Robotics Network (NFRN) brings together Canadian mobile robotics researchers,companies, and government players to integrate research efforts on the development of outdoor (field) roboticssystems to address the scientific, technological and operational challenges that hinder the use of completerobotics systems in natural environments. Specifically, our network will address issues of autonomous datacollection, environment modelling, positioning, navigation, detection and planning. These core competencies,and the software infrastructure that supports them, are the basis of key robotics applications that are of broadeconomic and scientific relevance.In addition to the principal applicants and participating companies, the proposal includes provision for asubstantial number ""Distal Fellows,"" academics who will also join the network as part of on an ongoingprocess.Outdoor environments are among the places where robots have the greatest potential, especially in theCanadian context. Robotic systems can be the key to monitoring and maintaining the state of ourenvironmental heritage, performing border patrol to assure the integrity of our borders, testing the quality ofour air and water, or even dealing with environmental disaster, nuclear accidents, toxic waste or search andrescue operations. These applications depend, however, on using teams of robots and combining differentrobotics technologies and, in some cases, different types of robot to effectively cover the diversity that is foundin the natural world. Together, the participants will identify the common challenges and approaches that willallow robotic systems to operate for extended periods in a range of domains. Putting this into practice involvesboth addressing scientific challenges to build and extend algorithms and solution techniques, but also thedevelopment of software tools and methods to allow these techniques to be deployed in real systems that canwork outside a controlled laboratory environment.