Borsa de TFE

The proposed project exists at the interface of robotics and marine biology. Specifically, we will collect and analyze data on how European spider crabs (Maja squinado) coordinate the movement of their legs to tackle various types of marine terrain, and then use this information to guide the development of control strategies for a bio-inspired Underwater Legged Robot (ULR). This project will fill an important knowledge gap as while several studies have already conducted gait analyses on European spider crabs on flat terrain, no current studies have assessed how these animals alter their gate when presented with variable terrains or steep/sheer inclines.
The JAE student will be involved in all the phases of the project, including the experimental design, data collection at an aquarium (the Oceanografic) in Valencia, and finally the application of the data collected from the crabs to the
ULR. More specifically, the student will be responsible for:
• Designing the experimental setup (number of individuals, number and type of terrains tested, use of external stimuli to trigger the crabs movement, duration of footage for analysis, etc…)
• Preparing the filming tanks at the Oceanografic and perform data collection.
• Labelling of the video dataset and performing motion tracking of joints using DeepLab Cut Software for markerless pose estimation.
• Performing a gait analysis for the selected terrains.
• Collecting morphological measurements on each video tracked individual, i.e. dry and underwater weight, length and weight of individual body parts, joint stiffness and range, tenacity of dactyls, etc …
• Scaling and adaptation of the strategies adopted by spider crabs to the ULR SILVER2 and benchmarking with respect to existing control strategies.

The student will be supervised by Dr. G. Picardi, who will provide expertise in biomechanics, visual tracking methodologies, robotics, and access to the ULR SILVER2. The student will also be supervised Dr. N.J. Robinson, who will provide expertise in spider crab physiology, experimental design involving live animals, and access to the Oceanographic facilities.

• Màster universitari en Enginyeria de Sistemes Automàtics i Electrònica Industrial

Inici inmediat

Programació en PYTHON

Joaquin del Rio
609926966
joaquin.del.rio@upc.edu