The MetaSensor Project

Automation is poised for widespread deployment from household to highway, awaiting only radical cost reductions that are just coming into view. The primary cost driver of high performance autonomous devices is the requirement for robust guidance, navigation, and control (GNC), particularly the precision sensor suite component. A radical new approach to sensor suite technology promises significant cost reductions without compromising performance. This project seeks to perform research, design, implement, and test a novel metasensor technology that combines currently available low-cost sensors with advanced calibration, filtering, estimation, system identification, and innovative control techniques to provide high-performance navigation, guidance, and control. The proposed metasensor system is intended to provide both the hardware and software functionality to control a large class of autonomous vehicles with minimal integration effort and extremely low cost.

The proposed metasensor consists of three functional blocks: (1) sensing elements and associated estimation and filtering algorithms, (2) robust, modular control elements that will control the vehicle to high-precision, and (3) hard real-time software architecture that allows for multiple threads to execute without concurrency or resource allocation issues. 

Intellectual Merit: Significant theoretical and practical advances combine to create the metasensor technology. Illustrating that current technological advances are at least as much about intellectual property and the integration of various disciplines as they are about the raw evolution of technology, the development of a metasensor suite requires a rigorous theoretical underpinning in a number of areas. Advancing the state of the art in algorithms, architecture, control concepts, calibration theory, and real-world interface design would have significant merit independently, even if expressed in an entirely abstracted form. Together, the concepts developed, papers written, and real-world validation will help provide the intellectual framework for a new era of affordable autonomous vehicles.

  

Broader Impact: The creation of low-cost metasensors that are flexible, low-cost, and provide robust GNC capabilities will have a dramatic effect on three roughly concentric areas of increasing generality: (1) UC Santa Cruz research will be greatly enhanced by both the development process and the resulting platform and test vehicles; (2) autonomous vehicle work in general will benefit from a significant shift in GNC price/performance ratio, and (3) there are potentially very large societal implications of bringing technologies undergoing rapid evolution (MEMs, GPS, low-cost sensors, raw computing power) into an area traditionally characterized by low-volume, expensive  technologies (inertial guidance systems, precision sensors, etc.)

The ongoing work for this effort has been folded into the efforts on the Robust UAV Autopilot. This project was funded by a NASA UARC Grant.

multimedia

1. • photos and images
   

Publications

1. (1)Vasconcelos, J., Elkaim, G., Silvestre, C., Oliveira, P., Cardeira, B., “Geometric Approach to Strapdown Magnetometer Calibration in Sensor Frame,” IEEE Transactions on Aerospace Electronic Systems, Vol. 47, No. 2, April 2011, pp. 1293-1306, doi:10.1109/TAES.2011.5751259. (pdf)
   

2. (2)Elkaim, G., “Misalignment Calibration Using Body Frame Measurements” American Control Conference, ACC13, Washington D.C., 17-19 June 2013, submitted (pdf)
   

3. (3)Elkaim, G. H., Foster, C., “Extension of a Non-Linear, Two-Step Calibration Methodology to Include Non-Orthogonal Sensor Axes,” IEEE Journal of Aerospace Electronic Systems, Vol. 44, No. 3, July 2008. (pdf)
   

4. (4)Gebre-Egziabher, D., Elkaim, G. H., “MAV Attitude Determination from Observations of Earth's Magnetic and Gravity Field Vectors,” IEEE Journal of Aerospace Electronic Systems, Vol. 44, No. 3. July 2008. (pdf)
   

5. (5)Elkaim, G., Lizarraga, M., Pedersen, L., “Comparison of Low-Cost GPS/INS Sensors for Autonomous Vehicle Applications,” ION/IEEE Position, Location, and Navigation Symposium, ION/IEEE PLANS 2008, Monterey, CA, May 5-8, 2008, pp. 285-293 (pdf)
   

6. (6)Vasconcelos, J., Elkaim, G., Silvestre, C., Oliveira, P., Cardeira, B., “A Geometric Approach to Strapdown Magnetometer Calibration in Sensor Frame,” IFAC Workshop on Navigation, Guidance, and Control of Underwater Vehicles, IFAC NGCUV 2008, Ireland, Apr. 8-10, 2008. (pdf)
   

7. (7)Elkaim, G., Foster, C., “Sensor Stability of a Low-Cost Attitude Sensor Suitable for Micro Air Vehicles,”ION National Technical Meeting, ION NTM 2007, San Diego, CA, Jan. 22-24, 2007, pp. 756-770 (pdf)
   

8. (8)Elkaim, G., Foster, C., “Development of the Metasensor: A Low-Cost Attitude Heading Reference System for use in Autonomous Vehicles,” Proceedings of the ION Global Navigation Satellite Systems Conference (ION-GNSS 2006), Fort Worth, TX, Sept. 22-24, 2006 (pdf)
   

9. (9)Gebre-Egziabher, D., Elkaim, G. H., “Calibration of Strapdown Magnetometers in the Magnetic Field Domain,” ASCE Journal of Aerospace Engineering. Vol. 19. No. 2. April 2006. pp 1-16 (pdf)
   

10. (10)D. Gebre-Egziabher, G. Elkaim, J.D. Powell, B. Parkinson, “A Non-Linear, Two-Step Estimation Algorithm for Calibrating Solid-State Strapdown Magnetometers,” 8th International St. Petersburg Conference on Navigation Systems (IEEE/AIAA), St. Petersburg, Russia, May 27-May 31, 2001 (pdf)
    

11. (11)D. Gebre-Egziabher, G. Elkaim, J.D. Powell, B. Parkinson, “A Gyro-Free Quaternion-Based Attitude Determination System Suitable for Implementation using Low-Cost Sensors,” IEEE Position Location and Navigations Symposium (IEEE PLANS), San Diego, 2000. pp. 185-192 (pdf)
    

People

1. • Gabriel Elkaim, Assistant Professor, Computer Engineering, UCSC, 831.459.3054
   

2. • Chris Foster, Masters Student (graduated), CE UCSC, now at Apple Computer.