Organizers:

Patrick Pfaff, and Wolfram Burgard
Institut für Informatik
Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg
Georges-Köhler-Allee, Geb. 079
D-79110 Freiburg
Germany

Objectives and Topics:

Whereas mobile robots act in the three-dimensional world, most of the research in the field of mobile robotics regarding models of the environment has focused on two-dimensional maps. The restriction to two-dimensional representations, however, is error-prone and has serious limitations. For example, the planning of paths may be incomplete if the three-dimensional world is mapped into two dimensions or even incorrect if some obstacles are missing in the two-dimensional description. Moreover, two-dimensional representations do not support typical tasks like searching for objects. For example, without knowledge about the three-dimensional structure of a shelf, a robot cannot plan appropriate viewpoints to find an object on the shelf. Thus, two-dimensional maps are not sufficient in situations in which robots are deployed in real-world scenarios. On the other hand, 3D-models of buildings (exterior and interior) and man-made objects are envisioned to be useful in a wide area of applications, which goes far beyond robotics, like architecture, emergency planning, interaction, and visualization. In all of these application domains, there is a need for methods that can automatically construct 3D-models.
The goal of this workshop is to establish an open forum about the recent advances in learning three-dimensional maps with mobile robots. Solicited papers are expected to come from various areas including but not limited to:

• Exploration of three-dimensional scenes
• Efficient scan alignment
• Vision
• Data reduction and approximation
• Flying vehicles
• Autonomous cars
• Search and rescue
• Outdoor robots

List of Speakers (accepted so far):

• 3D Laser-Based Obstacle Detection for Autonomous Driving
  D. Haehnel, S. Thrun
  Stanford University, USA
  
• Extraction of Dynamic Objects from 3D Point Clouds using Multimodal Detection and Tracking
  R. Triebel, Luciano Spinello, R. Siegwart
  ETH Zurich, Switzerland
  
• 3D Tracking and Mapping using Cooperative UAVs
  Mitch Bryson and Salah Sukkarieh
  Australian Center for Field Robotics, USYD, Australia
  
• Fast 3D Maps using Stereo Vision Only
  L. Paz, P. Pinies, J. Tardos, J. Neira
  Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain
  
• Realtime Extended 3D Reconstruction from Stereo for Navigation
  R. Rusu, B. Gerkey, K. Konolige, B. Morisset
  Intelligent Autonomous Systems, Informatik IX, TU Munich, Germany
  SRI Artificial Intelligence Center, CA, USA
  
• Interpretation of Urban Scenes based on Geometric Features
  R. B. Rusu, Z. C. Marton, N. Blodow, M Beetz,
  Intelligent Autonomous Systems, Informatik IX, TU Munich, Germany
  
• 3D Mapping the Kvarntorp Mine -- A Field Experiment for Evaluation of 3D Scan Matching Algorithms
  M. Magnusson, A. Nüchter, C. Lörken, A. Lilienthal, J. Hertzberg
  Örebro Universitet, Sweden
  
• Bridging Implementation and Theory: A clean view on parametrisiation of
  states with 3-D rotations by defining a encapsulation operator
  U. Frese, J. Kurlbaum
  University of Bremen, Germany
  
• Surface Reconstruction for 3D Robotic Mapping
  T. Wiemann, K.Lingemann, S. Stiene, J. Hertzberg, A. Nüchter
  University of Osnabrüuck, Germany
  
• J. Leonhard
  MIT, USA
  
• R. Kümmerle, P. Pfaff, W. Burgard,
  University of Freiburg
  
• 3D Building Recostruction from an Aerial Vehicle with Stereo-Camera and IMU,
  Conte, L. Iocchi, M. Hempel, G.D. Tipaldi
  University of Rome "La Sapienza", Italy,
  Linkoeping University, Sweden