Phone: +30-210-7721527 Address: Intelligent Automation Systems Group
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering
National Technical University of Athens
Zographou ,GR 15773
Athens, Greece
Ethical and social issues of robotics have attracted increasing attention from the scientific and... more Ethical and social issues of robotics have attracted increasing attention from the scientific and technical community over the years. These issues arise particularly in mental and sensitive robotic applications, such as robot-based rehabilitation, social robot (sociorobot) applications, and military robot applications. The purpose of launching this Special Issue was to publish high-quality papers addressing timely and important aspects of roboethics, and to serve as a dissemination source of novel ideas demonstrating the necessity of roboethics. The papers finally included in the Special Issue deal with fundamental aspects and address interesting deep questions in the roboethics and robophililosophy field.
European Journal of Advances in Engineering and Technology, 2018
The Internet of Things (IoT) is an enhancement of the Internet that can be described as things/ob... more The Internet of Things (IoT) is an enhancement of the Internet that can be described as things/objects in our environment being connected anytime and anywhere with anything and anyone, over the Internet, so as to give seamless communications and external services. Thus, IoT is a web of a tremendous number of connections of " things with things " , and " humans with things " , which is naturally more dynamic and more complex than the internet itself. The purpose of this article is to provide a summarized conceptual tour to IoT that covers ontological issues, characteristics, advantages and disadvantages, architectures and platforms, hardware and software components, and examples of typical applications.
Many recent studies (e.g., IFR: International Federation of Robotics, 2016) predict that the numb... more Many recent studies (e.g., IFR: International Federation of Robotics, 2016) predict that the number of robots (industrial, service/social, intelligent/autonomous) will increase enormously in the future. Robots are directly involved in human life. Industrial robots, household robots, medical robots, assistive robots, sociable/entertainment robots, and war robots all play important roles in human life and raise crucial ethical problems for our society. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the fundamental concepts of robot ethics (roboethics) and some future prospects of robots and roboethics, as an introduction to the present Special Issue of the journal Information on " Roboethics ". We start with the question of what roboethics is, as well as a discussion of the methodologies of roboethics, including a brief look at the branches and theories of ethics in general. Then, we outline the major branches of roboethics, namely: medical roboethics, assistive roboethics, sociorobot ethics, war roboethics, autonomous car ethics, and cyborg ethics. Finally, we present the prospects for the future of robotics and roboethics.
Our aim in this article is to provide a global discussion of the main issues concerning the syner... more Our aim in this article is to provide a global discussion of the main issues concerning the synergy of IoT and AI, including currently running and potential applications of great value for the society. Starting with an overview of IoT and AI fields, the article describes what is meant by the concept of "IoT-AI synergy", and summarizes the concepts of "Industrial IoT"(IIoT), "Internet of Robotic Things (IoRT) and "Industrial Automation IoT" (IAIoT). Then a number of case studies are outlined, and, finally, some IoT/AI-aided robotics and industrial automation applications are presented.
The aim of the law is to maintain social order, peace, and justice in society, whereas the aim of... more The aim of the law is to maintain social order, peace, and justice in society, whereas the aim of ethics is to provide codes of ethics and conduct that help people to decide what is wrong, and how to act and behave. Laws provide a minimum set of standards for obtaining good human behavior. Ethics often provides standards that exceed the legal minimum. Therefore, for the best behavior, both law and ethics should be respected. The Internet of Things (IoT) involves a large number of objects and humans that are connected via the Internet 'anytime' and 'anyplace' to provide homogeneous communication and contextual services. Thus, it creates a new social, economic, political, and ethical landscape that needs new enhanced legal and ethical measures for privacy protection, data security, ownership protection, trust improvement, and the development of proper standards. This survey and opinion article is concerned with the ethics and legislation of the IoT and provides an overview of the following: definition and history of the IoT; general ethical principles and theories that are available for application in the IoT; the role of governments in the IoT; regulations in the European Union (EU) and United States for the IoT' IoT characteristics that have the potential to create ethical problems; IoT ethical questions and principles; IoT security, privacy, and trust aspects; and the ethical culture of IoT-related companies.
International Robotics and Automation Journal, 2018
Most robotics and automation scientists believe that many new aspects emerging in robotics and a... more Most robotics and automation scientists believe that many new aspects emerging in robotics and automation (R&A), and aspects that are expected to emerge in future, call for the development of new cultural, ethical and legal regulations that can face efficiently the most delicate issues that may arise in real practice. Over the last two decades the subject of ethics in R&A has received a great attention and many important theoretical and practical results were derived in the direction of making robots and automation systems ethical. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue of ethics in robotics and automation, and outline major representative achievements in the field.
A recent discrete-time robotic model is employed and linearized to develop three different LQ-typ... more A recent discrete-time robotic model is employed and linearized to develop three different LQ-type robot controllers. These controllers are: optimal time-varying linear-quadratic controller (OTVLQ), OTVLQ controller with steady-state error elimination, and one-step ahead optimal LQ controller. These controllers require moderate computational effort and are offered for microprocessor-based implementation. Experimental results on a KUKA IR 160/15 robotic model verified the success and efficiency of the controllers.
A method for controlling a 6-degrees-of-freedom robotic manipulator based on a decomposition of i... more A method for controlling a 6-degrees-of-freedom robotic manipulator based on a decomposition of its full dynamical model in two 3-degrees-of-freedom submodels (one for the lower part and one for the upper part) is presented. The lower-part (arm) submodel takes into account the effect of the upper part (wrist) and of the robot task requirements, in the form of an external
This book explores the philosophical questions that arise in the development, creation, and use ... more This book explores the philosophical questions that arise in the development, creation, and use of mental robots that are capable of semiautonomous or autonomous operation, decision making and human like action, and are able to socially interact with humans exhibiting behavior similar to humans or animals. The book covers the six principal high-level mental capabilities of modern robots, namely cognition, intelligence, autonomy, consciousness, conscience, and ethics from a philosophical point of view. The material is presented in a fluent and clear way, starting with the general fundamental concepts of the topics covered.
This chapter presents the state-of-art of the bilateral teleoperation field. It starts with a dis... more This chapter presents the state-of-art of the bilateral teleoperation field. It starts with a discusion of the early class of techniques which are based on passivity and scattering theory. The main issue in bilateral telerobotic systems is the communication delay between the operator and the remote site (environment) which (if not treated) can lead the system to instability. The chapter continues by presenting the evolution of modern control techniques for stabilization and compensation of the time delay consequences. These techniques include : predictive control, adaptive control, sliding-mode robust control, neural learning control, fuzzy control and neurofuzzy control. Four case studies are reviewed which show what kind of results can be obtained.
Ethical and social issues of robotics have attracted increasing attention from the scientific and... more Ethical and social issues of robotics have attracted increasing attention from the scientific and technical community over the years. These issues arise particularly in mental and sensitive robotic applications, such as robot-based rehabilitation, social robot (sociorobot) applications, and military robot applications. The purpose of launching this Special Issue was to publish high-quality papers addressing timely and important aspects of roboethics, and to serve as a dissemination source of novel ideas demonstrating the necessity of roboethics. The papers finally included in the Special Issue deal with fundamental aspects and address interesting deep questions in the roboethics and robophililosophy field.
European Journal of Advances in Engineering and Technology, 2018
The Internet of Things (IoT) is an enhancement of the Internet that can be described as things/ob... more The Internet of Things (IoT) is an enhancement of the Internet that can be described as things/objects in our environment being connected anytime and anywhere with anything and anyone, over the Internet, so as to give seamless communications and external services. Thus, IoT is a web of a tremendous number of connections of " things with things " , and " humans with things " , which is naturally more dynamic and more complex than the internet itself. The purpose of this article is to provide a summarized conceptual tour to IoT that covers ontological issues, characteristics, advantages and disadvantages, architectures and platforms, hardware and software components, and examples of typical applications.
Many recent studies (e.g., IFR: International Federation of Robotics, 2016) predict that the numb... more Many recent studies (e.g., IFR: International Federation of Robotics, 2016) predict that the number of robots (industrial, service/social, intelligent/autonomous) will increase enormously in the future. Robots are directly involved in human life. Industrial robots, household robots, medical robots, assistive robots, sociable/entertainment robots, and war robots all play important roles in human life and raise crucial ethical problems for our society. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the fundamental concepts of robot ethics (roboethics) and some future prospects of robots and roboethics, as an introduction to the present Special Issue of the journal Information on " Roboethics ". We start with the question of what roboethics is, as well as a discussion of the methodologies of roboethics, including a brief look at the branches and theories of ethics in general. Then, we outline the major branches of roboethics, namely: medical roboethics, assistive roboethics, sociorobot ethics, war roboethics, autonomous car ethics, and cyborg ethics. Finally, we present the prospects for the future of robotics and roboethics.
Our aim in this article is to provide a global discussion of the main issues concerning the syner... more Our aim in this article is to provide a global discussion of the main issues concerning the synergy of IoT and AI, including currently running and potential applications of great value for the society. Starting with an overview of IoT and AI fields, the article describes what is meant by the concept of "IoT-AI synergy", and summarizes the concepts of "Industrial IoT"(IIoT), "Internet of Robotic Things (IoRT) and "Industrial Automation IoT" (IAIoT). Then a number of case studies are outlined, and, finally, some IoT/AI-aided robotics and industrial automation applications are presented.
The aim of the law is to maintain social order, peace, and justice in society, whereas the aim of... more The aim of the law is to maintain social order, peace, and justice in society, whereas the aim of ethics is to provide codes of ethics and conduct that help people to decide what is wrong, and how to act and behave. Laws provide a minimum set of standards for obtaining good human behavior. Ethics often provides standards that exceed the legal minimum. Therefore, for the best behavior, both law and ethics should be respected. The Internet of Things (IoT) involves a large number of objects and humans that are connected via the Internet 'anytime' and 'anyplace' to provide homogeneous communication and contextual services. Thus, it creates a new social, economic, political, and ethical landscape that needs new enhanced legal and ethical measures for privacy protection, data security, ownership protection, trust improvement, and the development of proper standards. This survey and opinion article is concerned with the ethics and legislation of the IoT and provides an overview of the following: definition and history of the IoT; general ethical principles and theories that are available for application in the IoT; the role of governments in the IoT; regulations in the European Union (EU) and United States for the IoT' IoT characteristics that have the potential to create ethical problems; IoT ethical questions and principles; IoT security, privacy, and trust aspects; and the ethical culture of IoT-related companies.
International Robotics and Automation Journal, 2018
Most robotics and automation scientists believe that many new aspects emerging in robotics and a... more Most robotics and automation scientists believe that many new aspects emerging in robotics and automation (R&A), and aspects that are expected to emerge in future, call for the development of new cultural, ethical and legal regulations that can face efficiently the most delicate issues that may arise in real practice. Over the last two decades the subject of ethics in R&A has received a great attention and many important theoretical and practical results were derived in the direction of making robots and automation systems ethical. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the issue of ethics in robotics and automation, and outline major representative achievements in the field.
A recent discrete-time robotic model is employed and linearized to develop three different LQ-typ... more A recent discrete-time robotic model is employed and linearized to develop three different LQ-type robot controllers. These controllers are: optimal time-varying linear-quadratic controller (OTVLQ), OTVLQ controller with steady-state error elimination, and one-step ahead optimal LQ controller. These controllers require moderate computational effort and are offered for microprocessor-based implementation. Experimental results on a KUKA IR 160/15 robotic model verified the success and efficiency of the controllers.
A method for controlling a 6-degrees-of-freedom robotic manipulator based on a decomposition of i... more A method for controlling a 6-degrees-of-freedom robotic manipulator based on a decomposition of its full dynamical model in two 3-degrees-of-freedom submodels (one for the lower part and one for the upper part) is presented. The lower-part (arm) submodel takes into account the effect of the upper part (wrist) and of the robot task requirements, in the form of an external
This book explores the philosophical questions that arise in the development, creation, and use ... more This book explores the philosophical questions that arise in the development, creation, and use of mental robots that are capable of semiautonomous or autonomous operation, decision making and human like action, and are able to socially interact with humans exhibiting behavior similar to humans or animals. The book covers the six principal high-level mental capabilities of modern robots, namely cognition, intelligence, autonomy, consciousness, conscience, and ethics from a philosophical point of view. The material is presented in a fluent and clear way, starting with the general fundamental concepts of the topics covered.
This chapter presents the state-of-art of the bilateral teleoperation field. It starts with a dis... more This chapter presents the state-of-art of the bilateral teleoperation field. It starts with a discusion of the early class of techniques which are based on passivity and scattering theory. The main issue in bilateral telerobotic systems is the communication delay between the operator and the remote site (environment) which (if not treated) can lead the system to instability. The chapter continues by presenting the evolution of modern control techniques for stabilization and compensation of the time delay consequences. These techniques include : predictive control, adaptive control, sliding-mode robust control, neural learning control, fuzzy control and neurofuzzy control. Four case studies are reviewed which show what kind of results can be obtained.
This talk addresses the FPGA design and implementation of intelligent control on a chip, specific... more This talk addresses the FPGA design and implementation of intelligent control on a chip, specifically fuzzy logic and genetic algorithm processing units, based on hardware description languages (HDL), Two application examples are discussed.
A hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) approach on the FPGA (in the loop) is presented for the optimized se... more A hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) approach on the FPGA (in the loop) is presented for the optimized sensor selection task of controlling a MAGnetic LEVitation (MAGNEV) system. Validation simulation results are provided for an EM suspension system.
An analysis and application of the strip-wise affine map to the path following task of autonomous... more An analysis and application of the strip-wise affine map to the path following task of autonomous non-holonomic mobile robots is presented, along with experimental results obtained using a calibrated camera and a video tracking algorithms.
A novel 'system-on-chip' (SoC) for the path following task of autonomous non-holonomic robots is ... more A novel 'system-on-chip' (SoC) for the path following task of autonomous non-holonomic robots is presented. Simulation results are discussed that show the effectiveness of the fuzzy path tracking algorithm.
Two methods are presented for distributed search algorithms development for multi-robot motion pl... more Two methods are presented for distributed search algorithms development for multi-robot motion planning, namely: (i) distributed gradient, and (ii) swarm intelligence theory.
Control of robot systems is a challenging area of robotics. The aim of robot control is to assure... more Control of robot systems is a challenging area of robotics. The aim of robot control is to assure proper and stable functioning of robots, under various conditions of their environment, so as to perform successfully and accurately their intended tasks. Robot systems are multivariable highly nonlinear systems that are subject to several uncertainties and disturbances. As a result, the design of accurate mathematical models for multi-degree of freedom (DOF) robots is very difficult. To face the above facts, a strong research activity, started in the 1960's, is still ongoing aiming at designing robust controllers that guarantee stable and efficient control despite the presence of large modeling uncertainties and external disturbances. Today there is a large variety of working robots (industrial robots, service robots, social robots, underwater robots, etc.) that perform various complex tasks, for which several control techniques were developed and documented in the literature. The sliding mode control (SMC) is indeed one of the best available methodologies and has been applied with success in many robotic and other publication of automation.
The aim of this special issue is to collect and publish high-qualty research and survey papers dealing with recent and new advancements in the area of robot control using the sliding mode control methodology.
This file provides the LINKS of the books of Spyros G. Tzafestas published during the period 2009... more This file provides the LINKS of the books of Spyros G. Tzafestas published during the period 2009-2018
Information, communication and automation technology (ICAT) ethics is the branch of applied ethi... more Information, communication and automation technology (ICAT) ethics is the branch of applied ethics and technoethics which investigates the social and ethical issues of the integrated multidisciplinary ICAT field in the broad sense that includes all kinds of automated systems through the use of ICT and computer based systems (autonomous control systems, communication systems, soware agents, robotic systems, etc.). This book involves 11 timely contributed chapters that cover a wide spectrum of topics in the ICAT ethics eld. ese topics include fundamental ethics concepts, ICAT ontology and history, ethics in storytelling for business intelligence, AI and human potential, ethics and social impact of automation, ICAT professional ethics and codes of ethics, ethics of IoT, human-AI moral gap, scientiic and ethical problems of computer-model based mischaracterization of serious human threats as low risk situations, social and existential issues of dynamic modernity in ICAT, and role of technoethics for the fullllment of humankind perfection.The study of ICAT ethics will help scientists and engineers to see why and how to avoid computer, communication, and automation technology abuse, and will make them behave as ethically responsible professionals. ICAT ethical perspectives are permanently in transition as technological advances move to novel unseen ICAT areas. ICAT ethics attempts to reveal the ethical dimensions of ICAT systems, and proposes proper ethical rules and principles based on traditional and modern ethical theories, that guide novel advancements towards moral/ethical practices that beneet the society. e book provides a rich source of information that can be probably used by graduate students and researchers on ICAT moral philosophy, ethics, and social impact in our digital era.
In this chapter we analyse a SoC implementation for the non-holonomic robot path tracking task us... more In this chapter we analyse a SoC implementation for the non-holonomic robot path tracking task using a fuzzy logic controller, along with a non-linear feedback-equivalence transformation which reduces path tracking to straight line tracking. The major components of the SoC are a parametrized Digital Fuzzy Logic Controller (DFLC) soft IP core Deliparaschos et al. (2006) Deliparaschos & Tzafestas (2006), implementing the fuzzy tracking algorithm, and Xilinx’s Microblaze soft processor core as the top level flow controller. The system was tied to a differential drive robot and experiments were performed in order to asses the efficacy and performance of the overall control scheme. This was facilitated using an image analysis algorithm, presented in the following sections, which calculated the robot’s position from a video stream captured using an overhead camera. The analysis was made off-line.
This book presents all major concepts, architectures and design methodologies of sociorobots (Soc... more This book presents all major concepts, architectures and design methodologies of sociorobots (Social robots, Socialized Robots). All types of sociorobots, walking, wheeled and fixed place, are examined.
This book provides a navigating introductory overview of the fundamental concepts, principles and... more This book provides a navigating introductory overview of the fundamental concepts, principles and problems in the field of roboethics (robot ethics). Medical, assistive, socialized,and war robot ethics is included and a review of Japanese roboethics is made.
The summaries of 24 books in control, robotics, manufacturing, and knowledge-based/expert systems... more The summaries of 24 books in control, robotics, manufacturing, and knowledge-based/expert systems published by the author (Single authored, Multi authored, and Contributed) are presented.
Uploads
Papers by spyros G tzafestas
The material is presented in a fluent and clear way, starting with the general fundamental concepts of the topics covered.
The material is presented in a fluent and clear way, starting with the general fundamental concepts of the topics covered.
The aim of this special issue is to collect and publish high-qualty research and survey papers dealing with recent and new advancements in the area of robot control using the sliding mode control methodology.
algorithm, and Xilinx’s Microblaze soft processor core as the top level flow controller. The system was tied to a differential drive robot and experiments were performed in order to asses the efficacy and performance of the overall control scheme. This was facilitated using an image analysis algorithm, presented in the following sections, which calculated the robot’s
position from a video stream captured using an overhead camera. The analysis was made off-line.
All types of sociorobots, walking, wheeled and fixed place, are examined.