At the dawn of the new millennium, robotics is undergoing a major transformation in scope and dimension. From a largely dominant industrial focus, robotics is rapidly expanding into the challenges of unstructured environments. Interacting with, assi- ing, serving, and exploring with humans, the emerging robots will increasingly touch people and their lives. The goal of the Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics (STAR) series is to bring, in a timely fashion, the latest advances and developments in robotics on the basis of their significance and quality. It is our hope that the wider dissemination of research - velopments will stimulate more exchanges and collaborations among the research community and contribute to further advancement of this rapidly growing field. The European Robotics Symposium (EUROS) was launched in 2006 as an inter- tional scientific single-track event promoted by EURON, the European Robotics Network linking most of the European research teams since its inception in 2000. Since then, EUROS has found its parental home under STAR, together with the other thematic symposia devoted to excellence in robotics research: FSR, ISER, ISRR, WAFR.

This unique reference represents a cross-section of forefront robotics research, ranging from robotics and systems to learning, autonomy and failure detection, from vision and navigation to localization and mapping, which are based on the papers presented at the 1st European Robotics Symposium (EUROS-06) held in Palermo, Italy from 16-18 March, 2006. The European Robotics Symposium (EUROS) is a brand-new International scientific event promoted by EURON, the European Robotics Network.

The International Symposium of Robotics Research (ISRR) continues to be the premiere meeting of the International Foundation of Robotics Research (IFRR). The 13th International Symposium of Robotics Research took place Novemb3r 26-29, 2007, in Hiroshima, Japan, and was organized by the two editors of this book. This volume brings a collection of a broad range of topics in robotics. The content of these contributions provides a wide coverage of the current state of robotics research: the advances and challenges in its theoretical foundation and technology basis, and the developments in its traditional and novel areas of applications. Historically, the proceedings of the ISRR have featured ground-breaking work of the highest caliber, which influenced generations to come. The present volume promises to be no exception. The collection of scientific articles in this volume provides new insights to important problems in robotics, written by some of the leaders in the field.

This book focuses on the problem of moving in a cluttered environment with pedestrians and vehicles. A framework based on Hidden Markov models is developed to learn typical motion patterns which can be used to predict motion on the basis of sensor data.

Recent advances in eye tracking technology will allow for a proliferation of new applications. Improvements in interactive methods using eye movement and gaze control could result in faster and more efficient human computer interfaces, benefitting users with and without disabilities. Gaze Interaction and Applications of Eye Tracking: Advances in Assistive Technologies focuses on interactive communication and control tools based on gaze tracking, including eye typing, computer control, and gaming, with special attention to assistive technologies. For researchers and practitioners interested in the applied use of gaze tracking, the book offers instructions for building a basic eye tracker from off-the-shelf components, gives practical hints on building interactive applications, presents smooth and efficient interaction techniques, and summarizes the results of effective research on cutting edge gaze interaction applications.

This volume presents a collection of papers presented at the 14th International Symposium of Robotic Research (ISRR). ISRR is the biennial meeting of the International Foundation of Robotic Research (IFRR) and its 14th edition took place in Lucerne, Switzerland, from August 31st to September 3rd, 2009. As for the previous symposia, ISRR 2009 followed up on the successful concept of a mixture of invited contributions and open submissions. Half of the 48 presentations were therefore invited contributions from outstanding researchers selected by the IFRR officers, and half were chosen among the 66 submissions after peer review. This selection process resulted in a truly excellent technical program which, we believe, featured some of the very best of robotic research. Out of the 48 presentations, the 42 papers which were finally submitted for publication are organized in 8 sections that encompass the major research orientations in robotics: Navigation, Control & Planning, Human-Robot Interaction, Manipulation and Humanoids, Learning, Mapping, Multi-Robot Systems, and Micro-Robotics. They represent an excellent snapshot of cutting-edge research in robotics and outline future directions.

By the dawn of the new millennium, robotics has undergone a major transformation in scope and dimensions. This expansion has been brought about by the maturity of the field and the advances in its related technologies. From a largely dominant industrial focus, robotics has been rapidly expanding into the challenges of the human world. The new generation of robots is expected to safely and dependably co-habitat with humans in homes, workplaces, and communities, providing support in services, entertainment, education, healthcare, manufacturing, and assistance. Beyond its impact on physical robots, the body of knowledge robotics has produced is revealing a much wider range of applications reaching across diverse research areas and scientific disciplines, such as: biomechanics, haptics, neuros- ences, virtual simulation, animation, surgery, and sensor networks among others. In return, the challenges of the new emerging areas are proving an abundant source of stimulation and insights for the field of robotics. It is indeed at the intersection of disciplines that the most striking advances happen. The goal of the series of Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics (STAR) is to bring, in a timely fashion, the latest advances and developments in robotics on the basis of their significance and quality. It is our hope that the wider dissemination of research developments will stimulate more exchanges and collaborations among the research community and contribute to further advancement of this rapidly growing field.

Robotics is undergoing a major transformation in scope and dimension. From a largely dominant industrial focus, robotics is rapidly expanding into human en- ronments and vigorously engaged in its new challenges. Interacting with, assisting, serving, and exploring with humans, the emerging robots will increasingly touch people and their lives. Beyond its impact on physical robots, the body of knowledge robotics has p- duced is revealing a much wider range of applications reaching across diverse research areas and scienti?c disciplines, such as: biomechanics, haptics, neu- sciences, virtual simulation, animation, surgery, and sensor networks among others. In return, the challenges of the new emerging areas are proving an abundant source of stimulation and insights for the ?eld of robotics. It is indeed at the intersection of disciplines that the most striking advances happen. The SpringerTracts in AdvancedRobotics(STAR) is devoted to bringing to the research community the latest advances in the robotics ?eld on the basis of their signi?cance and quality. Through a wide and timely dissemination of critical - search developments in robotics, our objective with this series is to promote more exchanges and collaborations among the researchers in the community and c- tribute to further advancements in this rapidly growing ?eld.

Dependence on a team of robots to carry out the exploration missions has many benefits such as speeding up the missions; provided that the coordination among robots is maintained. Many circumstances limit the communication which is crucial for the coordination among robots (e.g. impenetrable barriers, high temperature etc.). A periodic rendezvous strategy is considered in this dissertation a work-around in order to overlap communication ranges of the robots. Attending these periodic rendezvous sessions requires that the robots interrupt their current exploration progress periodically and traverse back to the rendezvous points (i.e. Interruptibility). During their trips to these points, they do not gain new knowledge since they cross already explored parts of the area. Therefore, using rendezvous strategies improves the team behaviour but has a negative impact on the time efficiency. Serendipity Rendezvous – the contribution of this dissertation - invests the dedicated time of Interruptibility trip in the inter-coordination among the robots by finding a serendipity path. This path is where the robot, which runs Serendipity Rendezvous, meets its colleagues accidentally on its way to the rendezvous point. The evaluation results show that Serendipity Rendezvous is able to mitigate the negative impact of Interruptibility while maintaining its positive impacts. Moreover, it provides a balance utilization of robots for the exploration activities. These results are achieved without affecting the already scheduled rendezvous. Hence, Serendipity Rendezvous optimizes periodic rendezvous sessions as long as the margin of the gaining knowledge by meeting other robots on the serendipity path is considered rewarded for the robots which run Serendipity Rendezvous.

This book includes the thoroughly refereed post-conference proceedings of the 13th RoboCup International Symposium, held in Graz, Austria, in June/July, 2009. They cover scientific contributions to a variety of research areas related to all RoboCup divisions.