I am interested in mobile robot autonomy. One of the first
problems encountered when robots operate outside controlled factory
and research environments is the need to perceive their surroundings. My
research focuses on efficient inference at the connection of linear
algebra and probabilistic graphical models for 3D mapping and
localization.
I have previously been a Research Scientist and a Postdoctoral
Associate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), in
John Leonard's Marine
Robotics Lab. In 2008 I have received my PhD in Computer Science from
the Georgia Institute of Technology, advised
by Frank Dellaert.
Oct 2014: I am Associate Editor for ICRA 2015, which will be held in Seattle.
Sep 2014: We have tested our in-water ship inspection robot on the NS Savannah, the first nuclear powered passenger and cargo ship, and a national historic landmark.
Aug 2014: I received a Google Faculty Research Award.
“Information Sparsification in Visual-Inertial Odometry” by J. Hsiung, M. Hsiao, E. Westman, R. Valencia, and M. Kaess. In IEEE/RSJ Intl. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems, IROS, (Madrid, Spain), Oct. 2018. Best conference paper finalist (one of six).Details. Download: PDF.
“Factor Graphs for Robot Perception” by F. Dellaert and M. Kaess. Foundations and Trends in Robotics, vol. 6, no. 1-2, Aug. 2017, pp. 1-139. Details.
“Articulated Robot Motion for Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (ARM-SLAM)” by M. Klingensmith, S. Srinivasa, and M. Kaess. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters (RA-L), 2016. Part of ICRA/RA-L: presented at ICRA 2016 and published in RA-L. Best vision paper finalist (one of five). Details. Download: PDF.
“Real-time Large Scale Dense RGB-D SLAM with Volumetric Fusion” by T. Whelan, M. Kaess, H. Johannsson, M.F. Fallon, J.J. Leonard, and J.B. McDonald. Intl. J. of Robotics Research, IJRR, vol. 34, no. 4-5, Apr. 2015, pp. 598-626. Details. Download: PDF.
“RISE: An Incremental Trust-Region Method for Robust Online Sparse Least-Squares Estimation” by D.M. Rosen, M. Kaess, and J.J. Leonard. IEEE Trans. on Robotics, TRO, vol. 30, no. 5, Oct. 2014, pp. 1091-1108. Details. Download: PDF.
“Temporally Scalable Visual SLAM using a Reduced Pose Graph” by H. Johannsson, M. Kaess, M.F. Fallon, and J.J. Leonard. In IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, ICRA, (Karlsruhe, Germany), May 2013. Best student paper finalist (one of five). Details. Download: PDF.
“Advanced Perception, Navigation and Planning for Autonomous In-Water Ship Hull Inspection” by F.S. Hover, R.M. Eustice, A. Kim, B.J. Englot, H. Johannsson, M. Kaess, and J.J. Leonard. Intl. J. of Robotics Research, IJRR, vol. 31, no. 12, Oct. 2012, pp. 1445-1464. Details. Download: PDF.
“iSAM2: Incremental Smoothing and Mapping Using the Bayes Tree” by M. Kaess, H. Johannsson, R. Roberts, V. Ila, J.J. Leonard, and F. Dellaert. Intl. J. of Robotics Research, IJRR, vol. 31, Feb. 2012, pp. 217-236. Details. Download: PDF.
“Multiple Relative Pose Graphs for Robust Cooperative Mapping” by B. Kim, M. Kaess, L. Fletcher, J.J. Leonard, A. Bachrach, N. Roy, and S. Teller. In IEEE Intl. Conf. on Robotics and Automation, ICRA, (Anchorage, Alaska), May 2010, pp. 3185-3192. Details. Download: PDF.
“Covariance Recovery from a Square Root Information Matrix for Data Association” by M. Kaess and F. Dellaert. Journal of Robotics and Autonomous Systems, vol. 57, Dec. 2009, pp. 1198-1210. Details. Download: PDF.
“iSAM: Incremental Smoothing and Mapping” by M. Kaess, A. Ranganathan, and F. Dellaert. IEEE Trans. on Robotics, vol. 24, no. 6, Dec. 2008, pp. 1365-1378. Details. Download: PDF.
“Square Root SAM: Simultaneous Localization and Mapping via Square Root Information Smoothing” by F. Dellaert and M. Kaess. Intl. J. of Robotics Research, vol. 25, no. 12, Dec. 2006, pp. 1181-1204. Details. Download: PDF.