Julien Bourgeois

University of Franche-Comté | UFC · Institut FEMTO-ST

Programmable matter refers to material that can be programmed to alter its physical properties, including its shape. Such matter can be built as a lattice of attached robotic modules, each seen as an autonomous agent with communication and motion capabilities. Self-reconfiguration consists in changing the initial arrangement of modules to form a de...

This paper proposes a novel approach that integrates hierarchical clustering (HC) into reinforcement learning algorithms to address the simultaneous resolution of hybrid assembly line balancing (ALB-1) and assembly sequence planning (ASP). The proposed approach attempts to capture implicit constraints, derived from accumulated experiences and indus...

This study proposes a dynamic simulation-based framework that utilizes swarm intelligence algorithms to optimize the design of hybrid assembly lines in the automotive industry. Two recent discrete versions of Whale Optimization Algorithm (named VNS-DWOA) and Gorilla Troops Optimizer (named DGTO) were developed to solve the assembly line balancing p...

Programmable matter refers to material that can be programmed to alter its physical properties, including its shape. Such matter can be built as a lattice of attached robotic modules, each seen as an autonomous agent with communication and motion capabilities. Self-reconfiguration consists in changing the initial arrangement of modules to form a de...

Modular robots are defined as autonomous kinematic machines with variable morphology. They are composed of several thousands or even millions of modules which are able to coordinate in order to behave intelligently. Clustering the modules in modular robots has many benefits, including scalability, energy-efficiency, reducing communication delay and...

In the recent years, fire departments started to build databases containing detailed information about their interventions during fires, road accidents, and other types of incidents. Their goal is to invest this information using data analysis methods in order to better understand the trends of certain events. This could help them enhance the manag...

In this paper, we propose a new self-reconfiguration scheme for modular robots based on a mm design that allows to form a 3D porous structure. The porous structure enables a parallel flow of modules inside it without blocking. The mm can also be used to fill its internal volume with an additional number of modules allowing the structure to be compr...

In this paper, we propose a new self-reconfiguration method based on organizing modules in meta-modules that form a 3D porous structure allowing modules to flow in parallel inside of it without blocking. We first propose a new meta-module model which can be used to fill in its internal volume an additional number of modules and describe the structu...

Modular robots are robots built from multiple modules which can reconfigure the shape of the whole robot. This makes them a promising technology to realize highly adaptable and re-configurable robots. One of the main challenges in modular robotics is to detect and heal the system from a state of partial or complete disconnection. Partial disconnect...

In this paper, we present a distributed Id assignment algorithm for modular robots. Our proposed solution supports both the removal and the addition of particles in the system, while maintaining particular characteristics in the logical tree, allowing for fast and efficient inter-module communications. The key goal here is to maintain easily calcul...

Moving a module in a modular robot is a very complex and error-prone process. Unlike in swarm, in the modular robots we are targeting, the moving module must keep the connection to, at least, one other module. In order to miniaturize each module to few millimeters, we have proposed a design which is using electrostatic actuator. However, this movem...

Robotics research needs complex hardware and software that is why simulation is often view as an alternative for testing. Large scale self-reconfiguring modular robotic systems needs a scalable simulation environment which cannot be physics-based.

The creation of current assembly lines can benefit from the new advances made in the fields of Computer Science and the Internet of Things (IoT) to increasetheir flexibility and improve their reliability. There are assembly line simulators developed for this purpose. However, these simulators have been designed to model every detail of the line and...

Programmable matter (PM) consists of tiny, mm-scale quasi-spherical robots that can be combined and programmed to form any arbitrary 3-D shape autonomously. While PM enables instant structural visualization and opens up a host of industrial and artistic applications, it also raises significant challenges in micro-robot control, communication, and a...

Shape-changing User Interfaces (UIs) explore the ability of a UI to change its physical shape to support multiple interaction modalities for users’ input and/or system’s output. An approach currently studied to implement such interfaces at a high resolution is based on mm-sized, round, and self-actuated modules. The problem we tackle in this paper...

Simulation is one of the most important tools for robotics research, as it serves several crucial purposes such as prototyping, learning, avoiding dispensable hardware costs, or studying future systems that cannot be fabricated yet. Large scale self-reconfiguring modular robotic systems are an instance of such systems. Yet, current modular robotic...

Programmable matter based on modular self-reconfigurable robots could stand as the ultimate form of display system, through which humans could not only see the virtual world in 3D, but manipulate it and interact with it through touch. These systems rely on self-reconfiguration processes to reshape themselves and update their representation, using m...

With Terahertz band (0.1–10 THz) technology, several nanoscale ad hoc applications could be developed, such as intrabody health monitoring, programmable material, etc. The fundamental element to ensure the functionality of these applications is the way to access the radio communication channel. The main challenge with nanocommunication is the need...

Moving a module in a modular robot is a very complex and error-prone process. Unlike in swarm, in the modular robots we are targeting, the moving module must keep the connection to, at least, one other module. In order to miniaturize each module to few millimeters, we have proposed a design which is using electrostatic actuator. However, this movem...

Robotics research needs complex hardware and software that is why simulation is often view as an alternative for testing. Large scale self-reconfiguring modular robotic systems needs a scalable simulation environment which cannot be physics-based. This paper presents VisibleSim, an open-source behavioral simulator for lattice-based modular robots t...

Shape-changing User Interfaces attract growing interest in Human-Computer Interaction. Modular robotics offer a great opportunity for their implementation. However, the current theoretical and technical advances of modular robotics are fragmented and little centered on the user. To unify existing work and center future research on the user, we perf...

We present a distributed framework for predicting whether a planned reconfiguration step of a modular robot will mechanically overload the structure, causing it to break or lose stability under its own weight. The algorithm is designed to be executed by the modular robot itself and is based on an distributed iterative solution of mechanical equilib...

We present a distributed framework for predicting whether a planned reconfiguration step of a modular robot will mechanically overload the structure, causing it to break or lose stability under its own weight. The algorithm is executed by the modular robot itself and based on a distributed iterative solution of mechanical equilibrium equations deri...

Modular robots are automated modules that can change their morphology self-sufficiently and progressively for control or reconfiguration purposes. Self-reconfiguration is a very challenging problem in modular robots systems. Existing algorithms are complex and not suitable for low resources devices. In this paper, we propose a parallel and fully di...

The vision for programmable matter is to create a material that can be reprogrammed to have different shapes and to change its physical properties on demand. They are autonomous systems composed of a huge number of independent connected elements called particles. The connections to one another form the overall shape of the system. These particles a...

This paper addresses the self-reconfiguration problem in large-scale modular robots for the purpose of shape formation for object representation. It aims to show that this process can be accelerated without compromising on the visual aspect of the final object, by creating an internal skeleton of the shape using the previously introduced sandboxing...

The recent progress in nanotechnologies is giving birth to a novel topology of wireless networks characterized by a high local density and an intensive node instability such as in WBAN and swarm micro-robots systems. In this paper, we show that classical and dedicated ad hoc nanonetwork routing solutions are inefficient in this case and present a l...

The self-reconfiguration of large swarms of modular robotic units from one object into another is an intricate problem whose critical parameter that must be optimized is the time required to perform a transformation. Various optimizations methods have been proposed to accelerate transformations, as well as techniques to engineer the shape itself, s...

Moving a module in a modular robot is a very complex and error-prone process. Unlike in swarm, in the modular robots we are targeting, the moving module must keep the connection to, at least, one other module. In order to miniaturize each module to few millimeters, we have proposed a design which is using electrostatic actuator. However, this movem...

In the literature we can find many kinds of modular robot that can build a wide variety of structures. In general, finding an assembly order to reach the final configuration, while respecting the insertion constraints of each kind of modular robot is a difficult process that requires system-specific tuning. In this article, we introduce a generic...

This paper presents an approach for tuning IoT activity in order to control the message transmission frequency to reduce energy consumption. More precisely, instead of letting an IoT sending out data periodically and monotonically, the approach allows the determination of wake-up, messages transmission and reception periods, when events occur at su...

New applications in the field of radio networks require a high concentration of micro-machines (micro-robots, sensors/actuators) in a small space. Those devices are characterized by a high volatility and limited computing, storage and energy capabilities. Traditional routing approaches in ad hoc networks are unusable due to a significant amount of...

Distributed self-reconfiguration in large-scale modular robots is a slow process and increasing its speed a major challenge. In this article, we propose an improved and asynchronous version of a previously proposed distributed self-reconfiguration algorithm to build a parametric scaffolding structure. This scaffold can then be coated to form the de...

The nano terahertz networks represent one of the promising areas in the field of wireless telecommunications. Technological advances in miniaturization of antennas and terahertz communications have paved the way for new network applications such as the body network, the programmable material and multi-core processors. Some of these applications req...

While researchers envision exciting applications for metamorphic systems like programmable matter, current solutions to the shape formation problem are still a long way from meeting their requirements. To dive deeper into this issue, we propose an extensive survey of the current state of the art of self/reconfiguration algorithms and underlying mod...

In the context of large distributed modular robots, self-reconfigura-tion is the process of having modules, seen as autonomous agents, acting together and moving to transform the morphology of their physical arrangement to produce a desired shape. However, due to motion constraints, the number of modules that can move concurrently is greatly limite...

In this paper, the problem of using prognostics information of Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) for post-prognostics decision in distributed MEMS-based systems is addressed. A strategy of post-prognostics decision is proposed and then implemented in a distributed MEMS-based conveying surface. The surface is designed to convey fragile and tin...

There are many ways to implement programmable matter. One is to build it as a huge modular self-reconfigurable robot composed of a large set of spherical micro-robots, like in the Claytronics project. These micro-robots must be able to stick to each other and move around each other. However, the shape of these micro-robots has not been studied yet...

The design phase of a car development is a long and tedious process requiring a lot of trials and errors. In this paper, we introduce a new concept aiming at making this process easier and more interactive. Our solution mixes self-reconfigurable autonomous robots forming programmable matter and a shape-memory polymer surface that produces an intera...

Among the diversity of the existing modular robotic systems, we consider in this paper the subset of distributed modular robotic ensembles composed of resource-constrained identical modules that are organized in a lattice structure and which can only communicate with neighboring modules. These modular robotic ensembles form asynchronous distributed...

The race for the miniaturization of electromechanical equipments has seen tremendous progress in recent years. In this context, nano-wireless networks composed of a large number of tiny equipments concentrated in a reduced area find multiple applications in the field of multi-core processors, programmable matter or nano-sensors networks. In order t...

A distributed modular robot is composed of many autonomous modules, capable of organizing the overall robot into a specific goal structure. There are two possibilities to change the morphology of such a robot. The first one, self-reconfiguration, moves each module to the right place, whereas the second one, self-assembly docks the modules at the ri...

This paper presents a versatile chip-level wireless driving method for microelectromechanical system (MEMS) actuators. A MEMS actuator is integrated as an electrical component of a coupled LCR resonant circuit, and it rectifies the energy sent through an ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) radio frequency (RF) wave. Two types of actuators were remotely drive...

Modular robots form autonomous distributed systems in which modules use communications to coordinate their activities in order to achieve common goals. The complexity of distributed algorithms is generally expressed as a function of network properties, e.g., the number of nodes, the number of links and the radius/diameter of the system. In this pap...

The aim of the Claytronics project is to build spherical micro-robots, called catoms for Claytronics atoms able to stick to each other and able to move around each other. An ensemble of catoms is therefore a huge modular self-reconfigurable robot. However, the shape of these catoms have not been studied yet and remains a difficult problem as there...

In this paper, we propose the Modular Robot Time Protocol (MRTP), a network-wide time synchronization protocol for modular robots (a class of distributed embedded systems) with neighbor-to-neighbor communications and potentially low-precision clocks. Our protocol achieves its performance by combining several mechanisms: central time master election...

Internet of Things (IoT) is a wireless network composed of a variety of heterogeneous objects such as Connected Wearable Devices (sensors, smartwatches, smartphones, PDAs ...), Connected Cars, Connected Homes,...etc. These things use generally wireless communication to interact and cooperate with each other to reach common goals. IoT(. T, n) is a n...

Recent advances in robotics technology have made it practical to deploy a large number of inexpensive robots in a wide range of application domains. In many of those applications, a group of autonomous robots is required to form a predefined geometric shape such as a line or a circle. This problem, namely pattern formation, is one of the most impor...

Programmable matter can be seen as a huge modular robot in which each module can communicate to its connected neighbors and work all together to achieve a common goal, more likely changing the shape of the whole robot. However, when the number of modules increases, the memory used in each module to store the target shape or the computation time to...

This paper presents a hybrid prognostics approach for Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS). The approach relies on two phases: an offline phase for the MEMS and its degradation modeling, and an online phase for its fault prognostics. The proposed approach is applied to a MEMS device consisting in an electro-thermally actuated valve. In the offli...