Autonomous robotic agents are on their way to becoming in-home personal assistants, construction assistants, and warehouse workers. The degree of autonomy of such systems is reflected by the manner in which we specify goals to them; the abstraction of low-level commands to high-level goals goes hand-in-hand with increased autonomy. In...
The objective of this dissertation is to enhance the monitoring of forest ecosystems through the utilization of remotely sensed data to address the exigencies posed by the Anthropocene. On a global scale, rising temperatures and fluctuating precipitation patterns have strained forests and produced shifts in natural disturbance regimes. Additionally, the...
The body of work aims to contribute to the area of Quantitative analysis in Environmental Sciences, and is focused on the microbiome. The underlying theme for the dissertation is methods and workflow. The unique bioinformatics workflow used for the analysis of genomic data was used to answer distinct and pressing...
Multi-robot teams offer promising solutions for many long term deployments in remote and dangerous domains, such as extraterrestrial or underseas exploration. However, long term deployments present many problems preventing robot teams from operating effectively. Learning over long time scales is makes it difficult to assign credit to robots' actions, as...
This dissertation presents novel, field-activated smart material systems for the actuation and control of autonomous robots. Smart materials, a type of material whose properties can be changed with an external stimuli, represent a promising direction to expand upon existing robotic control and actuation methods, particularly in the sub-fields of soft...
Hop (Humulus lupulus L. var. lupulus) is a diploid, dioecious plant with an extensive history of cultivation and use in brewing, as a textile, and for its therapeutic properties. Hop is prized for its ability to produce a variety of aromatic and flavor compounds, as well as compounds with anti-microbial...
Due to a growing body of literature documenting declines in pollinator populations, there has been increased public interest in pollinator conservation. In urban and suburban landscapes, many gardeners and urban land managers are interested in gardening for pollinators, particularly bees. Simultaneously, many homeowners and municipalities are interested in other aspects...
It is desirable for complex engineered systems to perform missions efficiently and economically, even when these missions' complex, variable, long-term operational profiles make it likely for hazards to arise. It is thus important to design these systems to be resilient so that they will actively prevent and recover from hazards...
Bacterial blight (Xanthomonas arboricola pv. corylina) (Xac) of hazelnut (Corylus avellana L.) was described first in Oregon in 1915 and is now recognized as a damaging disease of young hazelnut trees worldwide. Stressed hazelnut trees in conditions such as planting on marginal sites, and trees between 1 and 4-years-old are...
There is growing commercial interest in the use of multiagent systems in real world applications. Some examples include inventory management in warehouses, smart homes, planetary exploration, search and rescue, air-traffic management and autonomous transportation systems. However, multiagent coordination is an extremely challenging problem. First, information relevant for coordination is often...