Page 17 - Innovations in Intelligent Machines

4 L.C. Jain et al.

Fig. 1. Flight test of the Avatar UAV
(copyright of Agent Oriented Software, used by permission)

On the other hand, a flight test of an agent-controlled UAV, the Avatar
[17], has been successfully conducted in Australia, as shown in Figure 1.
The Avatar is equipped with an intelligent agent-based control system, with
the capability of real-time processing of flight and weather data, e.g. Avatar’s
position, air speed, ground speed, and drift, to assist the autopilot in deter-
mining the best route to fly.

3.2 Underwater Robot
Ocean exploration has attracted the attention of scientists for ages, as there
are many parts of the oceans that are unknown to humans. Another purpose
for exploring the oceans is because of commercial interests, e.g., communica-
tion cables, oil lines, and gas lines placed on the seabed. This has triggered
researches into intelligent underwater robots for inspecting lines and cables
faults, as well as for other scientific research purposes. Today, remotely oper-
ated vehicles (ROV) have been used as underwater robots, but controlling
these vehicles requires high skills in an unknown environment [18]. An exam-
ple of an underwater robot is shown in Figure 2. One of the applications of
this robot is to inspect and repair underwater pipelines [19]. The robot is con-
trolled from the surface with simple instructions, and it has to interact with
uncertainty in the environment to complete a given task.

3.3 Space Vehicle

One of the ultimate applications of intelligent machines is in space exploration.
In this domain, “Opportunity”, as shown Figure 3, is one of the latest Mars
rovers sent by NASA. Its mission is to explore Mars by maneuvering on the
surface of Mars, and sending images and information back to Earth.