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David C Conner
Postdoctoral Fellow

No longer a member of RI.

Email address: dcconner@ri.cmu.edu

For more information, see my personal homepage.

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I am investigating the development of control architectures that support autonomy. The foundation of the architecture will use linear, non-linear, and geometric control techniques to develop a palette of low level controllers that respect constraints due to actuator limitations or environmental restrictions. These low level controllers are combined using sequential composition and hybrid control theory to allow complex switching behaviors, while preserving the underlying stability and performance guarantees. The ultimate goal is to allow machines to operate with greater levels of autonomy in changing environments than is possible with current technology.

• Biorobotics - Conducting motion planning research for snake robots, mobile robots, and actuator arrays, mainly geared for scenarios where the robot does not have a priori knowledge of the world.
• Microdynamic Systems Laboratory - Exploring the limits of robotics in terms of speed, precision, dexterity and miniaturization.

• Controlled Coverage for Auto-Body Painting - Speeding up of the paint spray-gun path programming by automation, achieving uniform coverage.

• Integrating Planning and Control for Constrained Dynamical Systems
  D.C. Conner
  doctoral dissertation, tech. report CMU-RI-TR-08-01, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, January, 2008. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [5585 KB] copyrighted

• Valet Parking Without a Valet
  D.C. Conner, H. Kress-Gazit, H. Choset, A. Rizzi, and G.J. Pappas
  Proceedings of 2007 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2007), IEEE, San Diego, CA, October, 2007, pp. 572-577. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [187 KB] copyrighted

• Integrated Planning and Control for Convex-bodied Nonholonomic systems using Local Feedback Control Policies
  D.C. Conner, H. Choset, and A. Rizzi
  tech. report CMU-RI-TR-06-34, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, August, 2006. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [1774 KB] copyrighted

• Integrated Planning and Control for Convex-bodied Nonholonomic Systems Using Local Feedback
  D.C. Conner, H. Choset, and A. Rizzi
  Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems II, MIT Press, Philadelphia, PA, August, 2006, pp. 57-64. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [446 KB] copyrighted

• Towards Provable Navigation and Control of Nonholonomically Constrained Convex-BodiedSystems
  D.C. Conner, H. Choset, and A. Rizzi
  Proceedings of the 2006 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA '06), May, 2006. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [150 KB] copyrighted

• Paint Deposition Modeling for Trajectory Planning on Automotive Surfaces
  D.C. Conner, A.L. Greenfield, P. Atkar, A. Rizzi, and H. Choset
  IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, Vol. 2, No. 4, October, 2005, pp. 381 - 392. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [1368 KB] copyrighted

• Construction and Automated Deployment of Local Potential Functions for Global Robot Control and Navigation
  D.C. Conner, A. Rizzi, and H. Choset
  tech. report CMU-RI-TR-03-22, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, November, 2003. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [4316 KB], ps.gz [1904 KB] copyrighted

• Composition of local potential functions for global robot control and navigation
  D.C. Conner, A. Rizzi, and H. Choset
  Proceedings of 2003 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2003), IEEE, Vol. 4, October, 2003, pp. 3546- 3551. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [567 KB] copyrighted

• Experimental Verification of Deposition Models for Automotive Painting with Electrostatic Rotating Bell Atomizers
  D.C. Conner, A. Rizzi, and H. Choset
  Experimental Robotics VIII (proceedings of ISER '02), Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2003, pp. 136-145. [Abstract]

• Deposition Modeling for Paint Application on Surfaces Embedded in R^3
  D.C. Conner, P. Atkar, A. Rizzi, and H. Choset
  tech. report CMU-RI-TR-02-08, Robotics Institute, Carnegie Mellon University, October, 2002. [Abstract]
  Download: pdf [2036 KB] copyrighted