DANIEL VEDOVA
My name is Daniel Vedova. I am an Ensign in the U.S. Navy and my current post is to pursue a Master's degree in the Robotics Master's program at Carnegie Mellon, where I am a researcher in the Biorobotics Laboratory.
PROJECTS/RESEARCH
Portfolio of Work
REINFORCEMENT LEARNING FOR MOUNTAIN CAR PROBLEM
10-601: Introduction to Machine Learning
For one of the last assignments in my intro to machine learning class, I developed a Q-Learning framework to train an agent to solve the classic 'mountain car problem', in which there exists a car that does not initially have enough horsepower to directly drive up the mountain, so the car must 'learn' to drive back and forth in order to gather enough momentum to get up the hill.
MULTI-SCALE ADAPTIVE SEARCH
CMU Biorobotics Laboratory
As part of my graduate work in the Biorobotics Laboratory, I implemented a search algorithm developed by researchers at UTRC which allows for robots to trade off effectively between confirming the location of a 'target' and searching for new 'targets'.
VECTOR FIELD BASED OBSTACLE AVOIDANCE
16-811: Math Fundamentals of Robotics Final Project
For my final project in16-811, I developed a framework to allow a team of robots to uniformly cover a space containing elliptical obstacles. I was able to achieve this by defining elliptical vector fields at the center of each obstacle to steer agents away or around the obstacles.
AUTONOMOUS JOGGING ROBOT
Spring 2019 Robotics Capstone Project
For my robotics capstone class, I decided to build an automated jogging companion. The robot is capable of traversing moderately rugged terrain, and can carry personal items for a runner, such as their phone, keys, wallet, or water.
MAGNETIC SWIMMING ROBOT
Carnegie Mellon Biorobotics Laboratory
For two and a half years I conducted research on electromagnetically actuated swimming robots. These robots have no on-board electronics or computers. They have the potential to be scaled down to the micron scale, where they could be used to push the boundaries of medical research aimed at performing non-invasive drug delivery.
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This research has culminated in a paper which has been submitted and accepted to the 2019 Robotics: Science and Systems Conference.
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ROBOTIC SENTRY GUN
Winning Senior Mechanical Engineering Capstone Project
For my senior mechanical engineering design project, I decided to build a stationary turret capable of autonomously tracking and engaging a quad copter. Our system was awarded the "Best Overall Project" award - the highest honor awarded at the Design Expo. We were ranked first out of 12 teams at the expo.
5 DOF FEEDING ROBOT
CMU Biorobotics Lab
During my junior year, I developed a feeding routine for a 5 degree of freedom arm capable of performing a scooping motion and depositing the 'food' into a 'mouth'
A* PLANNING FOR PLANAR ROBOT
16-350: Planning Techniques for Robotics
Wrote my own A* planner to find an optimal path to a moving target for an omni-directional ground robot.
RRT PLANNER FOR N-DOF ROBOT ARM
16-350: Planning Techniques for Robotics
I wrote a planner for a planar robot arm of arbitrary configuration. I implemented and used the Rapidly-exploring Random Tree (RRT) algorithm to search through an N dimensional configuration space in order to find a collision-free path between two points in the robot's workspace.
SYMBOLIC PLANNER
16-350: Planning Techniques for Robotics
For my last project in Professor Maxim Likhachev's robot planning course, I wrote a symbolic planner capable of solving any problem that can be posed within a environment file.
HEXAPOD WIRELESS POWER AND COMMUNICATIONS MODULE
CMU Biorobotics Lab
During my Freshman year at CMU working in the Biorobotics Lab, I focused on designing a power and communications package for the snake monster hexapod robot
WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS AND POWER MODULE FOR SNAKE ROBOT
CMU Biorobotics Lab
During my sophomore year, I was able to scale down the system I developed in freshman year, and fit it into a smaller package capable of providing power and communications signals to the snake robot
GESTURE CONTROL FOR HEXAPOD ROBOT
CMU Biorobotics Lab
At the end of my sophomore year, I developed a gesture control algorithm to control the motion of a hexapod robot using only hand and arm signals
MORE PROJECTS
SHORTEST PATH FINDER USING DIJKSTRA SEARCH
16-811: Math Fundamentals of Robotics
During my first semester as a graduate student, in Prof. Erdmann's Math Fundamentals of Robotics course, I developed a framework to find the shortest path between two points in a space filled with convex polygons for a convex polygonal-shaped robot.
WINNING JUNIOR GRIPPER PROJECT
24-370: Engineering Design I
For my mechanical engineering design class, I was part of a 6 man team which participated in a gripper design challenge. The task was to create a gripper of minimum mass capable of holding onto an aluminum mass. Our gripper's mass of 48 grams allowed us to come in first out of 21 teams.
WINNING SOPHOMORE CRANE PROJECT
24-262: Stress Analysis
For the capstone project of my stress analysis class, I was part of a three man team which participated in a design competition to build a crane capable of lifting a 1lb weight as high as possible. Our lift height of 8.5" allowed us to place first out of 80 teams
WINNING SOPHOMORE USAR ROBOT
16-311: Introduction to Robotics
For the capstone project of my introduction to robotics class, I was part of a three man team which built a robot to compete in a robotic search and rescue challenge. Our design came in first out of 20 teams.
PROFESSIONAL HISTORY
My Experience
OPTICAL SYSTEMS INTERN - MIT LINCOLN LABORATORY
Summer 2019
Intern at MIT Lincoln Laboratory in Group 106 - Active Optical Systems.
Helped Design, analyze, and build new optical systems as an Optical Systems intern in Group 106.
GRADUATE RESEARCH ASSISTANT
Spring 2019 - Present
Graduate research assistant in Carnegie Mellon Biorobotics Lab.
LOADS AND DYNAMICS INTERN - THE BOEING COMPANY
Summer 2018
• Vibrations Shock and Acoustics intern for the NASA Space Launch System.
• Used PATRAN and NASTRAN to model and visualize various components when exposed to vibro-acoustic environments.
• Conducted vibro-acoustic model studies of three flight components and provided recommendations to NASA customers.
• Developed two Matlab scripts which automated analysis tasks turning two tedious one-hour tasks in PATRAN into simple 2-minute
operations.
STRUCTURAL MECHANICS INTERN - SANDIA NATIONAL LABORATORIES
Summer 2017
• Performed analysis on complex fastener geometries to produce more accurate results from simulations of
unconventional weapons systems failures.
• Implemented full FEA pipeline: Creating meshes, developing and running analysis code, as well as producing visualizations
using proprietary FFRDC simulation software.
UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH ASSISTANTÂ - CMU SCHOOL OF COMPUTER SCIENCE
Fall 2015Â - Spring 2019
• Lead undergraduate researcher for ferromagnetic swimming robot project. Performed research and helped write paper which has been submitted and accepted into the 2019 RSS Conference.
• Developed code base for control and actuation of swimming robot, produced experimental results, and evaluated theoretical statespace
models for system.
• Responsible for development of new wireless modules for the robots in the biorobotics lab