Hrl Laboratories, LLC

Bruce Hoff

David W Payton

Craig A Lee

Mike Howard

Mike Daily

Ronald Tadao Azuma

A method, an apparatus, and a computer program product for facilitating local signaling among a plurality of agents are presented. An agentincluding a digital processora transmitterand a directional receivercomprising a plurality of angular regionsis configured to enable the selection of a signal from a plurality of signals received on the basis of local data such as the strength of the received signal. The local data may be incorporated into a cumulative data portion of a signal that is passed from local agentto local agentacross a plurality of agentsin order to provide a gradient across the plurality of agentsThe gradient could be used, for example, to determine a shortest path across the agents. The signaling techniques described can also be used to determine the distance and direction to objects in the signaling path.

Method and apparatus for signaling among a plurality of agents

A method and apparatus for computing properties of a physical environment is provided, using a plurality of agents forming a distributed network embedded within the environment. The method comprises determining an initiating agent transmitting a signal including a cumulative cost value to neighboring agents and processing the signal at each neighboring agent to augment the cumulative cost value with local information If multiple signals are received, determining which has the best cumulative cost value for generating a new signal then treating the neighboring agent as an initiating agent and transmitting the new signal to neighboring agents and retaining the best augmented cost value in memory Methods further include determining paths using shortest path computations, using dual gradients for aligning agents on a path between two reference agents, and discovering and converging agents on choke points.

Method and apparatus for terrain reasoning with distributed embedded processing elements

A method for dynamic auto-calibration of a multi-sensor tracking system and apparatus incorporating it therein are presented. The method and apparatus utilize information from complementary sensors, filtered by a simultaneously running filter that combines the sensor data into an estimate of the state of the monitored system to iteratively tune the bias estimate. To track a dynamic system, complimentary or redundant sensors may be combined with a model of the system so that the uncertainty in the estimated state of the dynamic system is less than the noise in the individual sensors. In addition to noise, the sensors may have bias, which has the same value whenever the system is in a particular state. While estimating the actual value of the state, the present invention allows the estimator to determine the bias. The present invention, in its most general embodiment requires complex computations. However, significant simplifications have also been developed, which reduce the necessary computational power to a manageable level. The present invention has been reduced to practice in the context of a head-tracking system employing a plurality of sensors to determine the orientation of a human head.

Method for dynamic autocalibration of a multi-sensor tracking system and apparatus incorporating it therein

A method for controlling the movement of agents using local communications is provided. Generally, each agent maintains an optimal distance from other local neighbor agents by, for each agent selecting a local agent measuring the distance and angle to the agent performing a distance maintenance calculation and repeating the distance maintenance calculation for each local agent. In the distance maintenance calculation an attraction/repulsion map is used in order to determine whether an agent is attracted to or repelled from other agents. A motion vector is used to determine agent responses to the attraction or repulsion. Over time, the agents settle into a neutral configuration where each is optimally distanced from the other agents. Reference agents and leader agents can be designated to direct the movement of other agents, and agents can be designated as blocking beacons to repel other agents from undesirable areas.

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Venice, CA, United States of America

Bruce Hoff