Projects

The main objective of the HAV project is to research and develop the first Greek Autonomous Vehicle (Level 3+) for both research and commercial purposes. The project will enable the research entities to expand their current knowledge in developing the necessary autonomous driving subsystems and evaluate them on a real platform in real conditions, while the associated companies will be able to acquire and expand their know-how in this emerging industry field.

The main objective of the LINA project is the development of a low-cost humanoid robot with innovative features for use in special and general education. Besides reducing purchase costs, the integration of “smart” modules will allow therapists and teachers to exploit specific robot functions in a wide range of educational programs without the need for specialized personnel. The proposed hardware requirements and open-source development aims to optimize the robot’s capabilities for a wider variety of treatment sessions and educational activities keeping at the same time the robots’ cost at low levels.

The project aimed to create a series of explainable models of  Deep Learning which will:

• combine a high level of learning performance with explanatory feedback
• help human users understand, trust, and manage future autonomous systems more effectively

Using the developed explainable models, the new deep learning systems are able to explain their operation, characterize their strengths and weaknesses, and allow the user to easily understand how to operate and apply inference. In addition, the optimization process is now more easier for the user as it is simpler to detect errors and imperfections in the models.

EduBot is a complete educational product implemented by a humanoid robot that delivers developmental instruction modules to teach critical functional skills to children with physical, mental, or developmental disabilities. The product is based on the well-known NAO robot that has qualities that are very well-adapted to the needs of special education. Scientific findings report that children respond very well to small and friendly humanoid robots such as NAO, helping and teaching them certain skills, making intervention more accessible. Until now, current NAO solutions were not available in Greece due to the lack of Greek language support as well as to the absence of both available schemes and educational games tailored to the Greek psychoeducational needs.

The Autonomous Vehicle Emergency Recovery Tool (AVERT) provides a unique capability to Police and Armed Services to rapidly deploy, extract and remove both blocking and suspect vehicles from vulnerable positions such as enclosed infrastructure spaces, tunnels, low bridges as well as under-building and underground car parks. Vehicles can be removed from confined spaces with delicate handling, swiftly and in any direction to a safer disposal point to reduce or eliminate collateral damage to infrastructure and personnel. AVERT is commanded remotely and operates autonomously under its own power and sensor awareness, as a critical tool alongside existing technologies, thereby enhancing bomb disposal response speed and safety.

The main project goal was the design and construction of a high-performance civil UAV, appropriately equipped, for long day and night surveillance/patrol operations across segments of Greek borders and over forests.
The HCUAV was designed for missions primarily focused on:

• Broad area surveillance, on a 24h/7d basis patrol over segments of National borders.
• Forest regions surveillance, on a 24h/7d basis patrol operation.

Innovative hardware components together with clever software algorithms were included for the performance optimization of flight, control, surveillance and data collection systems to provide a low-cost, high-endurance, long-range and intelligent unmanned aerial surveillance system.
A Ground Control Station (GCS) with appropriate instrumentation for controlling, monitoring and post-processing of the real-time collected information was linked to the UAV.

The objective of project INFRA was to research and develop novel technologies for personal digital support systems as part of an integral, secure emergency management system to support First Responders (FR) in crises occurring in various types of Critical Infrastructures (CI) under all circumstances. Project INFRA focused on innovation at 2 levels:

• Create an open, standards based interoperability layer that allowσ: Full (voice and data) communication interoperability between all FR teams, their command posts and the CI site control centre, Full interoperability of FR applications in use by the FR teams.
• Provide practical and useful novel applications for FR teams, all integrated within the open interoperability layer: Thermal imaging applications, Video annotation, Advanced fibre optic sensors, Indoor navigation system.

Project INFRA provided a major step towards a standard, seamless, effective and efficient FR environment, ensuring interoperability with the CI control centre, saving lives and reducing the financial damages of catastrophic events in CI sites.

Development of an animated, instrumented humanoid model in simulation environment for use within PARIS SIM.

The RESCUER project focused on the development of an intelligent Information and Communication Technology and mechatronic Emergency Risk Management tool and on testing it in five Improvised Explosive Device Disposal, and Civil Protection Rescue Mission scenarios. The project output included guidance for management of risk, which extended the range of interventions possible beyond those, which are currently considered. The extended range of interventions included tasks which were too risky at current time to commit human involvement, tasks where access might not be possible without ICT and mechatronic support, tasks where such support would significantly enhance the speed, accuracy or range of tasks/sensors especially in EOD, IEDD, significant toxic/radiation/flammable/explosive contamination, mechanical failure and other relevant hazardous situations or combinations of hazards.

ICAM goal was to manufacture a fast camera with a high resolution for microgravity applications that can be used in other fields as well. The project was executed in the frame of development the next generation cameras for quantitative measurements in the frame of optical diagnostics tools used in microgravity research.