Connectionists: [jobs] Postdoctoral Fellow within Autonomous Navigation for Robots in Agriculture

[Pål Johan From]

Postdoctoral Fellow within Autonomous Navigation for Robots in Agriculture

The Faculty of Science and Technology at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) has a vacant two-year position as Postdoctoral Fellow within autonomous navigation for robots in the agricultural domain.

In order to exploit the great potential of robots in agriculture, these robots rely on accurate information on their own position and their surroundings. Precision operations such as harvesting and removal of weeds require the accuracy of navigation to be at the cm-level. Reliable estimates of navigation information with high accuracy is difficult with satellite-based systems alone, so one will have to rely on integrated solutions with information from many types of sensors such as e.g.: inertial sensors, cameras, laser scanners and ultra wideband radars.

In addition, these robots need to be equipped with the sufficient level of autonomy to be able to operate safely and reliably in a complex and dynamic environment. Task allocation and scheduling tasks for one or multiple robots is an important research topic. The robots need to operate in areas where humans and animals have access, and therefore need to do this in a safe way.
Main tasks

The main task of the candidate will be to implement safe and robust autonomy in the agricultural environment, and in particular for robots that operate both in the indoor and outdoor domain. The main activities will be related to one or more of the following topics:

    Safe and robust navigation in the agricultural environment. This includes both indoor (without, or with poor GNSS coverage) and outdoor environments.
    Obstacle avoidance in a dynamic environment.
    Safety, in particular recognition of dangerous situations for the robot and its environment.
    Optimal trajectory planning.
    Human-robot interaction.
    Certification and proven robustness.
    System integration.

The person appointed to the position will be expected to take an active part in the daily activities of the robotics group at REALTEK, including seminars, courses, etc.
Required Academic qualifications

  *   PhD in Engineering Cybernetics, Robotics, Control, or similar.
  *   Proficiency in mathematical modeling, control and statistical methods.
  *   Hands-on experience from implementing algorithms on real systems.
Desired Academic qualifications

  *   Experience with implementing Kalman filters, particle filters, or similar.
  *   Experience with Robot design and prototyping.
  *   Experience with Navigation algorithms such as waypoint navigation, SLAM, etc.
  *   Experience from large research projects or industry.
  *   Experience with Machine vision.
  *   Excellent programming skills, ROS, C/C++, Python
For more information, or to apply, please see https://www.jobbnorge.no/en/available-jobs/job/174712/postdoctoral-fellow-within-autonomous-navigation-for-robots-in-agriculture

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Pål Johan From, Ph.D.
Professor

Norwegian University of Life Sciences
Faculty of Science and Technology

[cid:833583F8-D3AC-4EEE-869A-3638B53186EC]

tel: +47 67231603
cel: +47 90690932
e-mail: pafr at nmbu.no

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