Emerging Approaches to Intelligent and Autonomous Systems

Dear Colleagues,

The impact of intelligent and autonomous systems (IAS) on modern society has continued to increasing over the last few years. Powered by advancements in artificial intelligence and robotics, intelligent and autonomous systems are radically transforming aspects of daily life that reach beyond the sphere of industry. In manufacturing, for example, autonomous robotic systems have improved efficiency and precision, leading to increased productivity; however, in retail, new consumer electronics (for example, robotic vacuum cleaners and smart home devices) have “taken over” the market, giving people access to advanced technologies in their everyday lives. In fact, autonomous systems have become an inherent part of the IoT (Internet of Things) and/or CPS (cyber–physical) systems, allowing for more dynamic operations, since their perceived intelligence is enhanced by accompanying sensors, external services, databases, or analytics results.

Regardless of the specialization/application domain of autonomous systems, they share many common challenges.  Most of these systems, in order to be called autonomous, operate in a dynamic environment and interact with other static and dynamic elements, exhibiting advanced behaviors that satisfy domain-specific requirements while serving a versatile range of functions. Mobile robots, drones, underwater robots, or even autonomous cars that function in a broad range of settings are typical examples of such systems.

Finally, a major challenge that has emerged of late is the seamless integration of service robots or, more broadly, autonomous/intelligent agents, into everyday environments. This is compounded by the need to make them easy to use and configure by non-roboticists, or people who lack high degrees of technical specialization, such as citizen developers. This challenge is far from trivial, since several hurdles exist towards making the end system soundly operable. For example, among other things, citizen developers should use a low-code approach to configuring/deploying their systems, smart inherent mechanisms should exist that offer security by design and automated tools for preemptive testing, and preventive simulations should allow for more robust applications.

This Special Issue, entitled “Emerging Approaches to Intelligent and Autonomous Systems”, will cover articles that deal with proposals for the adaptation of traditional algorithms such as SLAM, localization, path planning, navigation, and exploration/coverage in the new paradigm of intelligent systems, the proposal of solutions towards tackling the above mentioned challenges, modern approaches in the field of IAS (including smart environments, robots, and autonomous cars), as well as novel applications in the relevant fields.

This Special Issue will focus on topics including, but not be limited to:

• Mapping, localization, and SLAM;
• Path planning and navigation;
• Exploration and coverage of known/unknown environments;
• Multi-agent collaborative systems;
• IAS in the context of IoT/CPS systems;
• Applications for IAS;
• Security considerations and tools for IAS;
• IAS in the cloud domain;
• Model-driven engineering applications for IAS;
• Domain-specific languages in IAS;
• Low-code development of robotic systems and IAS.

Dr. Manos Tsardoulias
Prof. Dr. Andreas L. Symeonidis
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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• autonomous and intelligent systems
• autonomous robotics
• multiple agent systems
• autonomous systems algorithms
• autonomous cars
• internet of things
• cyber–physical systems
• model driven engineering
• systems security
• testing and validation