16-745: Dynamic Optimization: Project Suggestions
Robot cars
Develop an optimizer for a self-driving car that works in real time.
Start a company or get a job. Make lots of money.
Combinatorial Optimization: Efficient Search Over Discrete Actions
Parallel A* For Footstep Planning
How can we use a GPU, multiple threads/cores, or the vector instruction
set of a CPU to make A* more effective?
Choosing Motor Primitives And Their Arguments
How can we choose from a library of discrete behaviors which have
continuous arguments?
Trajectory Optimization
Newton-method-based Trajectory Optimization
Figure out efficient analytic 2nd derivatives for inverse dynamics,
and an optimization algorithm to use this information.
Vector SIMD-based Trajectory Optimization
Maximize performance of trajectory optimization using the vector instruction
set (AVX) of current Intel processors.
GPU-based Trajectory Optimization
Maximize performance of trajectory optimization using the latest
most expensive (and powerful) GPU.
Using Inverse Dynamics-based Trajectory Optimization When No or Multiple
Inverses Exist
How do we handle underactuated systems, double support in walking,
and contact in manipulation?
Designing Robust Behavior
Minimize Risk in Footstep Planning
How can we use probabilistic modeling to choose behavior to keep the
risk of failure below a threshold?
Efficient Policy Optimization Using Parallel Computation
Policy Optimization Using Multiple Models
How can we efficiently optimize a policy over a set of multiple models?
Inverse Optimal Control
Use inverse optimal control to establish what a reasonable optimization
criterion might be for rough terrain walking.
Optimize Perception For DRC Tasks
Treat designing a perception algorithm for doing a DRC task as an
optimization problem, with fixed computational resources and a library
of possible computational operations. A*, trajectory optimization,
and/or policy optimization might work.