This paper shows how methods from statistical relational learning can be used to address problems in grammatical inference using model-theoretic representations of strings. These model-theoretic representations are the basis of representing formal languages logically. Conventional representations include a binary relation for order and unary relations describing mutually exclusive properties of each position in the string. This paper presents experiments on the learning of formal languages, and their stochastic counterparts, with unconventional models, which relax the mutual exclusivity condition. Unconventional models are motivated by domain-specific knowledge. Comparison of conventional and unconventional word models shows that in the domains of phonology and robotic planning and control, Markov Logic Networks With unconventional models achieve better performance and less runtime with smaller networks than Markov Logic Networks With conventional models.

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The paper presents a receding horizon planning and control strategy for quadrotor-type micro aerial vehicle (mav)s to navigate reactively and intercept a moving target in a cluttered unknown and dynamic environment. Leveraging a lightweight short-range sensor that generates a point-cloud within a relatively narrow and short field of view (fov), and an ssd-MobileNet based Deep neural network running on board the mav, the proposed motion planning and control strategy produces safe and dynamically feasible mav trajectories within the sensor fov, which the vehicle uses to autonomously navigate, pursue, and intercept its moving target. This task is completed without reliance on a global planner or prior information about the environment or the moving target. The effectiveness of the reported planner is demonstrated numerically and experimentally in cluttered indoor and outdoor environments featuring maximum speeds of up to 4.5–5 m/s.

Co-design and integration of vehicle navigation and control and state estimation is key for enabling field deployment of mobile robots in GPS-denied cluttered environments, and sensor calibration is critical for successful operation of both subsystems. This paper demonstrates the potential of this co-design approach with field tests of the integration of a reactive receding horizon-based motion planner and controller with an inertial aided multi-sensor calibration scheme. The reported method provides accurate calibration parameters that improve the performance of the state estimator, and enable the motion controller to generate smooth and continuous minimal-jerk trajectories based on local LiDAR data. Numerical simulations in Unity, and real-world experimental results from the field corroborate the claims of efficacy for the reported autonomous navigation computational pipeline.