C. James Taylor

Lancaster University | LU · School of Engineering

This paper develops and evaluates state-dependent parameter (SDP) control systems for the hydraulically actuated dual-manipulators of a mobile nuclear decommissioning robot. A unified framework for calibration and SDP model identification is proposed, in which the state-dependent variable is a delayed voltage input associated with the time-varying...

True Digital Control: Statistical Modelling and Non–Minimal State Space Design develops a true digital control design philosophy that encompasses data–based model identification, through to control algorithm design, robustness evaluation and implementation. With a heritage from both classical and modern control system synthesis, this book is suppor...

There is growing interest in the use of control theory for interdisciplinary applications, where data may be sparse or missing, be non-uniformly sampled, have greater uncertainty, and where there is no opportunity to collect repeat measurements. In such applications, problems posed by observational data and the issue of missing or irregular data ne...

A control theory perspective on determination of optimal dynamic treatment regimes is considered. The aim is to adapt statistical methodology that has been developed for medical or other biostatistical applications to incorporate powerful control techniques that have been designed for engineering or other technological problems. Data tend to be spa...

We consider a control theory approach to adaptive dose allocation of anticoagulants, based on an analysis of records of 152 patients on long‐term warfarin treatment. We consider a selection of statistical models for the relationship between the dose of drug and subsequent blood clotting speed, measured through the international normalized ratio. Ou...

This study introduces a sophisticated supervised machine learning method for electric theft detection utilizing a customized Histogram Gradient Boosting (HGB) algorithm. Comprehensive preprocessing, including imputation, normaliza-tion, outlier management, and resampling, ensures the time-series data is accurately prepared for analysis. The SMOTE-E...

Wave energy shows potential to provide electricity in a renewable manner. The TALOS WEC (Wave Energy Converter) is a unique design with six PTO (Power Take-Off) elements to provide six Degrees of Freedom (DOFs), which is potentially able to harvest energy more efficiently than traditional single-DOF devices. As a step towards its optimisation and c...

The role of electricity theft detection (ETD) is critical to maintain cost-efficiency in smart grids. However, existing ETD methods cannot efficiently handle the sheer volume of data now available, being limited by issues such as missing values, high variance and non-linearity. An integrated infrastructure is also required for synchronizing diverse...

A technique for the in-situ localization of radioactivity is described in which the influence of γ-radiation impinging on a high-Z collimator, by which the angular response of a scintillation detector is constrained in order to identify the corresponding angular position of the radiation source, is expressed mathematically by way of a normalized si...

The study of wave-structure interactions involving nonlinear forces would often make use of the popular hybrid frequency–time domain method. In the hybrid method, the frequency-domain analysis could firstly provide the reliable and accurate dynamic parameters and responses; then these parameters and responses are transformed to the parameters to es...

Systems with time-varying time delays present a particularly challenging control problem. They have been observed across a wide array of domains, from hydraulic actuators to insulin delivery control systems. Control systems that address system time-delays, nonlinearities and uncertainty are the subject of much research but, whilst the specific conc...

An algorithm to investigate nonlinear systems with time delay variability is proposed. It automatically cycles through segments of an open loop experiment, capturing the directional change in the output via a pair of regression equations, and estimates the time delay accordingly. The method is a black-box, statistical approach that does not require...

Current panel methods for wave-structure interactions employ the potential flow theory, which provide fast, reliable and relatively accurate predictions for the marine structures, and now some open source packages, NEMOH and HAMS, are available. In this research, the relative utility and performance of NEMOH and HAMS is compared with the well-known...

The role of electricity theft detection (ETD) is critical to maintain cost-efficiency in smart grids. However, existing methods for theft detection can struggle to handle large electricity consumption datasets because of missing values, data variance and nonlinear data relationship problems, and there is a lack of integrated infrastructure for coor...

A novel, semi-autonomous radiological scanning system for inspecting irregularly shaped and radiologically uncharacterised objects in various orientations is presented. The system utilises relatively low cost, commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) electronic components, and is intended for use within relatively low to medium radioactive dose environments...

In Smart Grids (SG), Electricity Theft Detection (ETD) is of great importance because it makes the SG cost efficient. Existing methods for ETD cannot efficiently handle data imbalance, missing values, variance and non-linear data problems in the smart meter data. Therefore, an effective integrated strategy is required to address underlying issues a...

The impact of gamma radiation on a commercial off the shelf microcontroller board has been investigated. Three different tests have been performed to ascertain the radiation tolerance of the device from a nuclear decommissioning deployment perspective. The first test analyses the effect of radiation on the output voltage of the on-board voltage reg...

We describe the implementation of a bespoke two arm hydraulically actuated robotic platform which is used to semi-autonomously cut approximately 50 mm diameter pipes of three different materials: cardboard, ABS plastic and aluminium. The system is designed to be utilised within radiologically active environments where human access is limited due to...

The article investigates the idea of low-cost, telepresence-based mobile robots for eventual use within villages and rural areas in Nigeria, where diseases such as the Ebola Virus Disease (EVD) and Lassa Haemorrhagic Fever (LHF) are common, yet human intervention is constrained due to the great risk of transmission through bodily fluids. To illustr...

Uncertain time-delays can reduce the performance of hydraulic manipulator control systems. Variations in the time delay between, for example, an applied voltage and the associated manipulator movement, may be caused by the internal dynamics of the system and other nonlinear characteristics, such as fluid compressibility, dead-band of the pump, valv...

Sliding Mode Control (SMC) systems are developed for a hydraulic manipulator. The control model is obtained via state-dependent parameter (SDP) system identification. In contrast to previous research using discrete-time SDP models, in which the model coefficients are functions of the sampling interval , the present work develops a new continuous-ti...

A novel, semi-autonomous radiological scanning system for inspecting uncharacterised objects is presented. The research utilises commercially available off-the-shelf (COTS) electronic components, intended for use in relatively low radioactive dose environments. To illustrate the concept, a Microsoft Kinect, a Universal Robots UR3 (6 degree of freed...

Estimating accurate forward and inverse dynamics models is a crucial component of model-based control for sophisticated robots such as robots driven by hydraulics, artificial muscles, or robots dealing with different contact situations. Analytic models to such processes are often unavailable or inaccurate due to complex hysteresis effects, unmodell...

Autonomous analysis of plants, such as for phenotyping and health monitoring etc., often requires the reliable identification and localization of single leaves, a task complicated by their complex and variable shape. Robotic sensor platforms commonly use depth sensors that rely on either infrared light or ultrasound, in addition to imaging. However...

This work focuses on implementing the optimal power flow (OPF) problem, considering wind, solar and hy-dropower generation in the system. The stochastic nature of renewable energy sources (RES) is modelled using Weibull, Log-normal and Gumbel probability density functions. The system-wide economic aspect is examined with additional cost functions s...

Today’s electricity grid is rapidly evolving, with increased penetration of renewable energy sources (RES). Conventional Optimal Power Flow (OPF) has non-linear constraints that make it a highly non-linear, non-convex optimisation problem. This complex problem escalates further with the integration of RES, which are generally intermittent in nature...

The research behind this article is motivated by robotic operations in radiologically contaminated environments, notably for nuclear decommissioning. However, the experiments reported within are based on a recently reconfigured, hydraulically-actuated, dual manipulator robot that is being used for R&D into both tele-operation and autonomy in a non-...

Electricity load forecasting has always been a significant part of the smart grid. It ensures sustainability and helps utilities to take cost-efficient measures for power system planning and operation. Conventional methods for load forecasting cannot handle huge data that has a nonlinear relationship with load power. Hence an integrated approach is...

We consider a control theory approach to adaptive dose allocation of anticoagulants, based on an analysis of records of 152 patients on long‐term warfarin treatment. We consider a selection of statistical models for the relationship between the dose of drug and subsequent blood clotting speed, measured through the international normalized ratio. Ou...

Proportional-integral-plus (PIP) control provides a logical extension to conventional two- or three-term (proportional-integral-derivative) industrial control, with additional dynamic feedback and input compensators introduced when the process has second order or higher dynamics, or time delays. Although PIP control has been applied in a range of e...

The well-known electrical analogy for thermal modelling is based on the observation that Fourier's equation for one dimensional heat transfer takes the same form as Ohm's law. This provides a system for creating and resolving complex heat transfer problems using an established set of physically-based equations. In this article, such a model is deve...

This article concerns a previously developed, Fractional-order, Generalised Predictive Control (FGPC) approach to control system design. Here, fractional order concepts are utilised to extend the design flexibility of the FGPC algorithm, in comparison to conventional Generalised Predictive Control (GPC). The performance of FGPC is investigated via...

The well-known electrical analogy for thermal modelling is based on the observation that Fourier’s equation for one dimensional heat transfer takes the same form as Ohm’s law. This provides a system for creating and resolving complex heat transfer problems using an established set of physically-based laws. The present article illustrates the concep...

On the Sellafield site there are several legacy storage tanks and silos containing sludge of uncertain properties. While there are efforts to determine the chemical and radiological properties of the sludge, to clean out and decommission these vessels, the physical properties need to be ascertained as well. Shear behaviour, density and temperature...

The pulse shape discrimination performance of a pixelated plastic scintillator has been investigated. The scintillator has been built using 169 plastic scintillator blocks (arranged into a 13 X 13 square array) of 2.8 X 2.8 X 15 mm each. The scintillator was coupled with a single-channel photomultiplier tube. The scintillator was exposed to a mixed...

This article investigates visual servoing for a hydraulically actuated dual-arm robot, in which the user selects the object of interest from an on-screen image, whilst the computer control system implements via feedback control the required position and orientation of the manipulators. To improve on the current joystick direct tele-operation common...

In order to integrate uncertainty estimates into deep time-series modelling, Kalman Filters (KFs) (Kalman et al., 1960) have been integrated with deep learning models, however, such approaches typically rely on approximate inference techniques such as variational inference which makes learning more complex and often less scalable due to approximati...

The use of ground-based robotic systems for the characterization of nuclear environments is reviewed. Almost since the dawn of the nuclear energy industry, man has somewhat inadvertently created environments in which access has been constrained primarily due to the risk posed by extreme levels of radiation exposure but also due to space constraints...

An investigation into the gamma-ray modulation properties of a tungsten coded aperture, whose design is based on the mathematical principles of Modified Uniformly Redundant Arrays (MURA), has been performed. Due to the small size of the individual cells, the aperture was built using additive manufacturing methods. The gamma-ray field was produced b...

A control theory approach to the management of the blood clotting speed using the anticoagulant Warfarin is investigated. Controllers are developed and analysed using hospital data from patients with chronic conditions under Warfarin anticoagulation treatment. Proportional Integral (PI) and Model Predictive (MPC) controllers are used to estimate tr...

This paper shows how a standard proportional-integral-plus controller, based on a non-minimal state space (NMSS) design, can be extended to reduce the effects of measurement noise and so yield smoother control inputs for automated drug delivery control applications. Use of a NMSS model for state variable feedback control design, in which all the st...

A mobile camera is used to support an assisted teleoperation pipe-cutting system for nuclear decommissioning. The base system consists of dual-manipulators with a single mounted Kinect camera. The user selects the object from an on-screen image, whilst the computer control system automatically grasps the pipe with one end-effector and positions the...

Smart grid provides an opportunity for customers as well as for utility companies to reduce electricity costs and regulate generation capacity. The success of scheduling algorithms mainly depends upon accurate information exchange between main grids and smart meters. On the other hand, customers are required to schedule loads, respond to energy dem...

A mobile camera is used to support an assisted teleoperation pipe-cutting system for nuclear decommissioning. The base system consists of dual-manipulators with a single mounted Kinect camera. The user selects the object from an on-screen image, whilst the computer control system automatically grasps the pipe with one end-effector and positions the...

The robotic platform in this study is being used for research into assisted tele-operation for common nuclear decommissioning tasks, such as remote pipe cutting. It has dual, seven-function, hydraulically actuated manipulators mounted on a mobile base unit. For the new visual servoing system, the user selects an object from an on-screen image, whil...

The United Kingdom (UK) has a significant legacy of nuclear installations to be decommissioned over the next 100 years and a thorough characterisation is required prior to the development of a detailed decommissioning plan. Alpha radiation detection is notoriously time consuming and difficult to carry out due to the short range of alpha particles i...

The optimal refined instrumental variable method for the estimation of the Box–Jenkins (BJ) model is modified so that it functions as an optimal filter and state-estimation algorithm. In contrast to the previously developed minimal and non-minimal state-space (NMSS) forms for an Auto-Regressive Moving Average with eXogenous variables (ARMAX) model,...

The CAPTAIN Toolbox is a collection of Matlab algorithmic routines for time series analysis, forecasting and control. It is intended for system identification, signal extraction, interpolation, forecasting and control of a wide range of linear and non-linear stochastic systems across science, engineering and the social sciences. This article briefl...

The robotic platform in this study has dual, seven-function, hydraulically actuated manipulators, which are being used for research into assisted tele-operation for common nuclear decommissioning tasks, such as pipe cutting. The article concerns the identification of state-dependent parameter (SDP) models for joint angle control. Compared to earlie...

The research behind this article ultimately concerns control system robustness and optimisation for the regulation of temperatures in multiple buildings that are linked to a controllable external heating supply network. Lancaster University campus is being used as a case study, for which the building management system provides data. Nonetheless, si...

This article addresses the coupling of acoustic secondary sources in a confined space in a sound field reduction framework. By considering the coupling of sources in a rectangular enclosure, the set of coupled equations governing its acoustical behavior are solved. The model obtained in this way is used to analyze the behavior of multi-input multi-...

The research behind this article primarily concerns the development of mobile robots for nuclear decommissioning. The robotic platform under study has dual, seven-function, hydraulically actuated manipulators, for which the authors are developing a vision based, assisted teleoperation interface for common decommissioning tasks such as pipe cutting....

An adaptive treatment strategy is a set of rules for choosing effective medical treatments for individual patients. In the statistical literature, methods for optimal dynamic treatment (ODT) include Q-learning and A-learning methods, which are linked to machine learning in engineering and computer science. The research project behind this article a...

The first part of the article provides an overview of both single-axis and multi-axis wave energy converter (WEC) technology, with a particular focus on present and past prototype devices. The second part of the article considers a multi-axis concept device that has been developed and tank tested at Lancaster University by successive Master of Engi...

This article concerns the problem of dynamic modeling and parameter estimation for a seven degree of freedom hydraulic manipulator. The laboratory example is a dual–manipulator mobile robotic platform used for research into nuclear decommissioning. In contrast to earlier control model orientated research using the same machine, the article develops...

Background Chemical genetics provides a powerful alternative to conventional genetics for understanding gene function. However, its application to plants has been limited by the lack of a technology that allows detailed phenotyping of whole-seedling development in the context of a high-throughput chemical screen. We have therefore sought to develop...