In 2011, I earned my PhD from MIT in the EECS Dept while working in CSAIL as a part of the Marine Robotics Group headed by Professor John Leonard.
PhD Thesis, "Long-term Mobile Robot Mapping in Dynamic Environments", May 2011
CV
About Me
RESEARCH
I am truly passionate in seeing physical environments becoming seamlessly enhanced with robotics and autonomous systems. My PhD work involves developing an architecture for an autonomous mobile robot operating in dynamic environments for long periods. The robot is required to operate in large-scale, unknown environments, detect and collect specific data that changes over time, cope with physical changes, and manage large amounts of data. As a result, the robot must construct and maintain a current model of its environment. The model must capture both the physical layout and the specific data in the environment that the robot is tracking. My research focuses on two key challenges. The first is to develop autonomous exploration and mapping algorithms for sustained operation in dynamic environments. The second is to develop a strategy that enables a persistent robot to maintain an up-to-date model of its environment, while coping with physical changes.
A. Walcott-Bryant, M. Kaess, H. Johannsson, and J.J. Leonard, "Dynamic Pose Graph SLAM: Long-term Mapping in Low Dynamic Environments." In IEEE/RSJ Intl. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems, IROS, (Vilamoura, Portugal), Oct. 2012. [pdf]
A. Walcott. "Long-term Mobile Robot Mapping in Dynamic Environments", MIT PhD Thesis, May 2011. [pdf]
A. Walcott and John Leonard. “Long-Term Autonomous Navigation And Mapping In Dynamic Environments,” MIT
Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory Abstract. 2007. [pdf]
A. Walcott and B. Williams, "Efficient Extraction of Optimal, Temporally Flexible Plans," in Proceedings of the 4th International Symp. on Robotics and Automation (ISRA 2006),
A. Walcott, "Unifying Model-based Programming and Randomized Path Planning Through Optimal Search. MIT SM Thesis, Cambridge, MA, June 2004. [pdf]
Brian C. Williams, Phil
Kim, Michael Hofbaur, Jon How, Jon Kennell, Jason Loy,
Robert Ragno, John Stedl and Aisha Walcott, “Model-based Reactive Programming of
Cooperative Vehicles for Mars Exploration.” Int. Symp. on Artificial Intelligence,
Robotics and Automation in Space, St-Hubert, Canada,
June 2001. [pdf]
In February 2010 I received the MIT MLK Leadership Award and gave my first (and perhaps last) Impromptu Speech. A couple months prior, I was given an Ambush Makeover by Glamour magazine for dressing like an MIT student while in sunny FL. The Ambush was featured on the Today Show!
SELECTED SERVICE PROJCTS
Community Technology Center- Laare, Kenya -LACOTEC
We are
collectoing computers and related equipment to take
over to the Community Technology Center in Laare,
Kenya Jan 2007. If you have any equipment or ideas
feel free to contact us (see web page).
http://laare.csail.mit.edu/MIT- Africa Internet Technology Initiative (AITI)
I had the
honor to be a part of the MIT-AITI
Ghana 2004 team.
We taught Computer Programming with Java and
Entrpreneurship at the Universtiy of Ghana, Legon.
Life changing experience!MIT-AITI Ghana 2004 Java and Entrpreneurship Course Materials
MIT Center For Bits and Atoms (CBA) Fab Labs
I spent a few
weeks helping to set up a Fab Lab at the
Takoradi Technical Institue in Ghana, West Africa.This
project was through the MIT Media Lab Center for Bits and
Atoms. Again, another amazing and life changing
experience!
Takoradi
Fab
Lab Report