Professor Alan Winfield's Outputs (122)

When robots tell each other stories: The emergence of artificial fiction (2017)
Book Chapter

This essay outlines a proposal for an embodied computational model of storytelling, using robots. If it could be built, the model would open the possibility for experimental demonstration and investigation of how simple narrative might emerge from in... Read More about When robots tell each other stories: The emergence of artificial fiction.

Rational imitation for robots: the cost difference model (2017)
Journal Article

© 2017, © The Author(s) 2017. Infants imitate behaviour flexibly. Depending on the circumstances, they copy both actions and their effects or only reproduce the demonstrator’s intended goals. In view of this selective imitation, infants have been cal... Read More about Rational imitation for robots: the cost difference model.

The euRathlon 2015 grand challenge: The first outdoor multi-domain search and rescue robotics competition— A Marine perspective (2016)
Journal Article

© 2016, Marine Technology Society Journal. All rights reserved. The euRathlon project was an FP7-funded Coordination and Support Action (2013–2015). Itsmain aim was to organize outdoor robotics competitions in realistic search and rescue response sce... Read More about The euRathlon 2015 grand challenge: The first outdoor multi-domain search and rescue robotics competition— A Marine perspective.

An immune-inspired swarm aggregation algorithm for self-healing swarm robotic systems (2016)
Journal Article

© 2016 Elsevier Ireland Ltd Swarm robotics is concerned with the decentralised coordination of multiple robots having only limited communication and interaction abilities. Although fault tolerance and robustness to individual robot failures have ofte... Read More about An immune-inspired swarm aggregation algorithm for self-healing swarm robotic systems.

Adaptive foraging for simulated and real robotic swarms: The dynamical response threshold approach (2016)
Journal Article

Developing self-organised swarm systems capable of adapting to environmental changes as well as to dynamic situations is a complex challenge. An efficient labour division model, with the ability to regulate the distribution of work among swarm robots... Read More about Adaptive foraging for simulated and real robotic swarms: The dynamical response threshold approach.

euRathlon 2015: A multi-domain multi-robot grand challenge for search and rescue robots (2016)
Presentation / Conference Contribution

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016. Staged at Piombino, Italy in September 2015, euRathlon 2015 was the world’s first multi-domain (air, land and sea) multi-robot search and rescue competition. In a mock-disaster scenario inspired b... Read More about euRathlon 2015: A multi-domain multi-robot grand challenge for search and rescue robots.

Rational imitation for robots (2016)
Presentation / Conference Contribution

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016. Infants imitate behaviour flexibly. Depending on the circumstances, they copy both actions and their effects or only reproduce the demonstrator’s intended goals. In view of this selective imitatio... Read More about Rational imitation for robots.

A Novel Design for a Robot Grappling Hook for use in a Nuclear Cave Environment (2016)
Journal Article

© 2016 Within the field of robotics there exist few designs for detachable grappling hooks. This paper focusses on the novel design of a detachable grappling hook for use within a nuclear cave environment. The design seeks to exploit the complex netw... Read More about A Novel Design for a Robot Grappling Hook for use in a Nuclear Cave Environment.

Evolvable robot hardware (2015)
Book Chapter

While the theory and practice of evolutionary robotics is well established, most work to date has been concerned with evolving a robot’s control system – it’s software. This chapter is concerned instead with the more difficult problem of how to evolv... Read More about Evolvable robot hardware.

On the evolution of behaviors through embodied imitation (2015)
Journal Article

© 2015 Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Abstract This article describes research in which embodied imitation and behavioral adaptation are investigated in collective robotics. We model social learning in artificial agents with real robots. The... Read More about On the evolution of behaviors through embodied imitation.

Towards verifiably ethical robot behaviour (2015)
Presentation / Conference Contribution

Ensuring that autonomous systems work ethically is both complex and difficult. However, the idea of having an additional ‘governor’ that assesses options the system has, and prunes them to select the most ethical choices is well understood. Recent wo... Read More about Towards verifiably ethical robot behaviour.

Editorial: Special issue on ground robots operating in dynamic, unstructured and large-scale outdoor environments (2015)
Journal Article

Real-world outdoor applications of ground robots have, to date, been limited primarily to remote inspection of suspected explosive devices and, with less success, to the broader domain of remote survey and inspection in hazardous environments. Such r... Read More about Editorial: Special issue on ground robots operating in dynamic, unstructured and large-scale outdoor environments.

An artificial immune system for self-healing in swarm robotic systems (2015)
Presentation / Conference Contribution

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015. Swarm robotics is concerned with the decentralised coordination of multiple robots having only limited communication and interaction abilities. Although fault tolerance and robustness to individua... Read More about An artificial immune system for self-healing in swarm robotic systems.

Robots with internal models: A route to self-aware and hence safer robots (2014)
Book Chapter

The aim of this chapter is to set out the case for building robots with internal models as a possible route toward achieving a level of functional self-awareness that would usefully extend the capabilities of autonomous robots. The chapter argues tha... Read More about Robots with internal models: A route to self-aware and hence safer robots.

A low-cost real-time tracking infrastructure for ground-based robot swarms (2014)
Book Chapter

A tracking infrastructure is a useful tool for swarm robotics research, and has many potential applications. Unfortunately, for many research laboratories, constructing one may be prohibitively expensive. In this paper we present a low-cost tracking... Read More about A low-cost real-time tracking infrastructure for ground-based robot swarms.

Estimating the energy cost of (artificial) evolution (2014)
Presentation / Conference Contribution

This short discussion paper sets out to explore the question: what is the energy cost of evolving complex artificial life? The paper takes an unconventional approach by first estimating the energy cost of natural evolution and, in particular, the spe... Read More about Estimating the energy cost of (artificial) evolution.

The next big thing(s) in robotics (2014)
Book Chapter

Towards exogenous fault detection in swarm robotic systems (2014)
Book Chapter

It has long been assumed that swarm systems are robust, in the sense that the failure of individual robots will have little detrimental effect on a swarm’s overall collective behaviour. However, Bjerknes and Winfield [1] have recently shown that this... Read More about Towards exogenous fault detection in swarm robotic systems.

euRathlon Outdoor Robotics Challenge: Year 1 Report (2014)
Book Chapter

Towards an ethical robot: Internal models, consequences and ethical action selection (2014)
Presentation / Conference Contribution

If robots are to be trusted, especially when interacting with humans, then they will need to be more than just safe. This paper explores the potential of robots capable of modelling and therefore predicting the consequences of both their own actions,... Read More about Towards an ethical robot: Internal models, consequences and ethical action selection.