eprintid: 10206663 rev_number: 7 eprint_status: archive userid: 699 dir: disk0/10/20/66/63 datestamp: 2025-03-28 14:24:38 lastmod: 2025-03-28 14:24:38 status_changed: 2025-03-28 14:24:38 type: article metadata_visibility: show sword_depositor: 699 creators_name: Bonzini, Aramis Augusto creators_name: Seminara, Lucia creators_name: Macciò, Simone creators_name: Carfi, Alessandro creators_name: Jamone, Lorenzo title: Robotic Haptic Exploration of Object Shape with Autonomous Symmetry Detection ispublished: inpress divisions: UCL divisions: B04 divisions: F48 keywords: Shape Estimation, Haptic Exploration, Haptic Perception, Tactile Sensing, Symmetry note: This version is the author accepted manuscript. For information on re-use, please refer to the publisher’s terms and conditions. abstract: Haptic robotic exploration aims to control the movements of a robot with the objective of touching an object and retrieving physical information about it. In this work, we present an innovative exploration strategy to simultaneously detect symmetries in a 3D object and use this information to enhance shape estimation. This is achieved by leveraging a novel formulation of Gaussian Process models that allows the modeling of symmetric surfaces. Our procedure does not assume any prior knowledge about the object, neither about its shape nor about the presence and type of symmetry, necessitating only an approximate estimate of the size and boundaries (bounding box). We report experimental results both in simulation and in the real world, showing that using symmetric models leads to a reduction in shape estimation error, exploration time, and in the number of physical contacts performed by a robot when exploring objects that have symmetries. date: 2025-02-20 date_type: published publisher: Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) official_url: https://doi.org/10.1109/tro.2025.3544113 oa_status: green full_text_type: other language: eng primo: open primo_central: open_green verified: verified_manual elements_id: 2371757 doi: 10.1109/TRO.2025.3544113 lyricists_name: Jamone, Lorenzo lyricists_id: LJAMO17 actors_name: Flynn, Bernadette actors_id: BFFLY94 actors_role: owner full_text_status: public publication: IEEE Transactions on Robotics issn: 1552-3098 citation: Bonzini, Aramis Augusto; Seminara, Lucia; Macciò, Simone; Carfi, Alessandro; Jamone, Lorenzo; (2025) Robotic Haptic Exploration of Object Shape with Autonomous Symmetry Detection. IEEE Transactions on Robotics 10.1109/TRO.2025.3544113 <https://doi.org/10.1109/TRO.2025.3544113>. (In press). Green open access document_url: https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10206663/1/Robotic_Haptic_Exploration_of_Object_Shape_with_Autonomous_Symmetry_Detection.pdf