○International Award

Mr. Yuta NAKAI
He received his B.E. degree from Keio University, Japan, in 2023. He received the Outstanding Student Award from the Society of Instrument and Control Engineers of Japan in 2023. He is currently pursuing the M.E. degree at Keio University. His research interests include optimal decision-making for automated vehicles.

Prof. Toru NAMERIKAWA
He received his B.E., M.E., and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from Kanazawa University, Kanazawa, Japan, in 1991, 1993, and 1997, respectively. In 2009, he joined Keio University, Yokohama, Japan, where he is currently a Professor with the Department of System Design Engineering and a Director of the School of Integrated Design Engineering, Graduate School of Science and Technology. He has held visiting positions at Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich in 1998, University of California, Santa Barbara in 2001, University of Stuttgart in 2008 and Lund University in 2010. He is serving as an associate editor for IEEE Trans. on Control Systems Technology and IET Control Theory & Applications. His main research interests are distributed and cooperative control, game theory, and their application to cyber-physical systems including mobility, security, and power networks. He received the 2014 Pioneer Technology Award from SICE Control Division and the 2017 Outstanding Paper Award from SICE.

受賞論文「Cooperative Control of CAVs Using Control Barrier Function at Signal-free Intersection Considering Real Environment」
This study addresses the cooperative control of CAVs (Connected and Automated Vehicles) at Signal-free intersections. The purpose is to reduce fuel consumption by crossing intersections without stopping as much as possible while ensuring safety. For this problem, We consider a two-stage control structure. The first stage is to calculate the merging time of each CAV by solving mixed integer linear programming (MILP). In the second stage, each CAV solves the optimal control problem and determines the input in time for the merging time. In this study, We propose an optimal control method using a control barrier function considering a more realistic scenario, and a speed regulation zone to cross the intersection at a pre-determined terminal speed. By using input corrections and trajectory tracking of speed and position, simulation results show that fuel consumption can be reduced while ensuring safety. Finally, compared to conventional research, the system achieves low fuel consumption, and demonstrates its superiority.

Ms. Himari TOCHIOKA
She received an M.F.A. degree in intermedia art from Tokyo University of the Arts in 2017 and a B.F.A. degree in oil painting from Kyoto Seika University in 2014. She also studied at the University of Edinburgh through an exchange program. She worked as an intern at Gwangju Biennale. She is currently an Academic Project Support Staff at the University of Tokyo. Her current research interests include visualization projects that cross art and science disciplines, ranging from optical phenomena to interdisciplinary approaches such as intermedia art.

Dr. Tomohiro SUEISHI
He received his B.E. degree in information physics and his M.E. and Ph.D. degrees in information science and technology from the University of Tokyo, in 2012, 2014, and 2017, respectively. He was a JSPS Research Fellow (DC1) from 2014 to 2017, and a Project Assistant Professor at the University of Tokyo from 2017 to 2020. He is currently a Project Lecturer at the University of Tokyo. His current research interests include high-speed tracking, high-speed optical control, and dynamic vision system.

Prof. Masatoshi ISHIKAWA
He received the B.E., M.E., and Dr. Eng. degrees in mathematical engineering and information physics from the University of Tokyo, Japan, in 1977, 1979, and 1988, respectively. After he worked at Industrial Products Research Institute, Tsukuba, Japan, he moved to the University of Tokyo in 1989. He was a vice-president and an executive vice-president of the University of Tokyo, from 2004 to 2005, and from 2005 to 2006, respectively. Now he is the president of Tokyo University of Science from 2022. His current research interests include sensor fusion, high-speed vision, high-speed intelligent robots, visual feedback, and dynamic interaction. He was the president of SICE in 2011 and the president of IMEKO from 2018 to 2021.

受賞論文「Bounce Mark Visualization System for Ball Sports Judgement Using High-Speed Drop Location Prediction and Preceding Mirror Control」
Referee assistance systems are widely used to ensure fairness with regard to the line judgement in ball sports such as tennis. The current systems estimate the three-dimensional trajectory of the ball and make in/out decisions based on the positional relationship between the ball and court lines. However, this approach does not consider the actual ball bounce mark and may cause an estimation error in the order of several millimeters from the actual ball drop location.

This article proposes a ball bounce mark visualization system with three components. (1) The system performs high-speed ball drop location prediction. The system measures the three-dimensional trajectory of the ball with multiple high-speed cameras and triangulation, estimates the motion state with a Kalman filter, and predicts the ball drop location on a real-time basis. (2) The system takes the preceding mirror control approach to turn the angle of view of a high-resolution camera towards the predicted ball drop location before the ball drops. (3) The system takes high-resolution texture images of the ground surface immediately before and after the ball drops and extracts the difference between the two to visualize the ball bounce mark.

We validated the feasibility of the proposed system through three evaluation experiments that confirmed that the predicted drop location error at 500 fps has an operable time of 90 ms relative to the ball radius (34 mm), that there is sufficient convergence time in the mirror response, and that the bounce mark can be clearly visualized with a spatial resolution of 2 px or more. We will evaluate the performance of the system in environments that are closer to actual tennis matches in terms of speed and scale, leading to the realization of a practical referee assistance system.

○Young Author’s Award

Dr.Hisayoshi MURAMATSU
He received the B.E. degree in system design engineering and the M.E. and Ph.D. degrees in integrated design engineering from Keio University, Yokohama, Japan, in 2016, 2017, and 2020, respectively. From 2019 to 2020, he was a Research Fellow with the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Since 2020, he has been with Hiroshima University, Higashihiroshima, Japan. His research interests include motion control, robotics, mechatronics, and control engineering.

受賞論文「Control Design and Experiments of Four Arms Robot with Wheel-Legged Mobility and Constraints」
We have been developing a four arms robot that has hybrid locomotion and loco-manipulation capabilities. For control of the robot, the presentation proposed a control framework including a motion generator, trajectory modification with angle, velocity, and acceleration constraints, and angle controller considering torque limits. In the experiments, the proposed control algorithm enabled the robot to perform locomotion and manipulation tasks with the satisfaction of the motors' constraints without motors' deactivation.