Fully-fused Multi-Layer Perceptrons on Intel Data Center GPUs

This paper presents a SYCL implementation of Multi-Layer Perceptrons (MLPs), which targets and is optimized for the Intel Data Center GPU Max 1550. To increase the performance, our implementation minimizes the slow global memory accesses by maximizing the data reuse within the general register file and the shared local memory by fusing the operations in each layer of the MLP. We show with a simple roofline model that this results in a significant increase in the arithmetic intensity, leading to improved performance, especially for inference. We compare our approach to a similar CUDA implementation for MLPs and show that our implementation on the Intel Data Center GPU outperforms the CUDA implementation on Nvidia's H100 GPU by a factor up to 2.84 in inference and 1.75 in training. The paper also showcases the efficiency of our SYCL implementation in three significant areas: Image Compression, Neural Radiance Fields, and Physics-Informed Machine Learning. In all cases, our implementation outperforms the off-the-shelf Intel Extension for PyTorch (IPEX) implementation on the same Intel GPU by up to a factor of 30 and the CUDA PyTorch version on Nvidia's H100 GPU by up to a factor 19. The code can be found at https://github.com/intel/tiny-dpcpp-nn.

D$^2$-JSCC: Digital Deep Joint Source-channel Coding for Semantic Communications

Semantic communications (SemCom) have emerged as a new paradigm for supporting sixth-generation applications, where semantic features of data are transmitted using artificial intelligence algorithms to attain high communication efficiencies. Most existing SemCom techniques utilize deep neural networks (DNNs) to implement analog source-channel mappings, which are incompatible with existing digital communication architectures. To address this issue, this paper proposes a novel framework of digital deep joint source-channel coding (D$^2$-JSCC) targeting image transmission in SemCom. The framework features digital source and channel codings that are jointly optimized to reduce the end-to-end (E2E) distortion. First, deep source coding with an adaptive density model is designed to encode semantic features according to their distributions. Second, digital channel coding is employed to protect encoded features against channel distortion. To facilitate their joint design, the E2E distortion is characterized as a function of the source and channel rates via the analysis of the Bayesian model and Lipschitz assumption on the DNNs. Then to minimize the E2E distortion, a two-step algorithm is proposed to control the source-channel rates for a given channel signal-to-noise ratio. Simulation results reveal that the proposed framework outperforms classic deep JSCC and mitigates the cliff and leveling-off effects, which commonly exist for separation-based approaches.

Hierarchical generative modelling for autonomous robots

Humans can produce complex whole-body motions when interacting with their surroundings, by planning, executing and combining individual limb movements. We investigated this fundamental aspect of motor control in the setting of autonomous robotic operations. We approach this problem by hierarchical generative modelling equipped with multi-level planning-for autonomous task completion-that mimics the deep temporal architecture of human motor control. Here, temporal depth refers to the nested time scales at which successive levels of a forward or generative model unfold, for example, delivering an object requires a global plan to contextualise the fast coordination of multiple local movements of limbs. This separation of temporal scales also motivates robotics and control. Specifically, to achieve versatile sensorimotor control, it is advantageous to hierarchically structure the planning and low-level motor control of individual limbs. We use numerical and physical simulation to conduct experiments and to establish the efficacy of this formulation. Using a hierarchical generative model, we show how a humanoid robot can autonomously complete a complex task that necessitates a holistic use of locomotion, manipulation, and grasping. Specifically, we demonstrate the ability of a humanoid robot that can retrieve and transport a box, open and walk through a door to reach the destination, approach and kick a football, while showing robust performance in presence of body damage and ground irregularities. Our findings demonstrated the effectiveness of using human-inspired motor control algorithms, and our method provides a viable hierarchical architecture for the autonomous completion of challenging goal-directed tasks.

A Novel Autonomous Robotics System for Aquaculture Environment Monitoring

Implementing fully automatic unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) monitoring water quality is challenging since effectively collecting environmental data while keeping the platform stable and environmental-friendly is hard to approach. To address this problem, we construct a USV that can automatically navigate an efficient path to sample water quality parameters in order to monitor the aquatic environment. The detection device needs to be stable enough to resist a hostile environment or climates while enormous volumes will disturb the aquaculture environment. Meanwhile, planning an efficient path for information collecting needs to deal with the contradiction between the restriction of energy and the amount of information in the coverage region. To tackle with mentioned challenges, we provide a USV platform that can perfectly balance mobility, stability, and portability attributed to its special round-shape structure and redundancy motion design. For informative planning, we combined the TSP and CPP algorithms to construct an optimistic plan for collecting more data within a certain range and limiting energy restrictions.We designed a fish existence prediction scenario to verify the novel system in both simulation experiments and field experiments. The novel aquaculture environment monitoring system significantly reduces the burden of manual operation in the fishery inspection field. Additionally, the simplicity of the sensor setup and the minimal cost of the platform enables its other possible applications in aquatic exploration and commercial utilization.

A Novel Autonomous Mobile Platform for Monitoring Fish Habitat

Implementing fully automatic unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) monitoring water quality is challenging since effectively collecting environmental data while keeping the platform stable and environmental-friendly is hard to approach. To address this problem, we construct a USV that can automatically navigate an efficient path to sample water quality parameters in order to monitor the aquatic environment. The detection device needs to be stable enough to resist a hostile environment or climates while enormous volumes will disturb the aquaculture environment. Meanwhile, planning an efficient path for information collecting needs to deal with the contradiction between the restriction of energy and the amount of information in the coverage region. To tackle with mentioned challenges, we provide a USV platform that can perfectly balance mobility, stability, and portability attributed to its special round-shape structure and redundancy motion design. For informative planning, we combined the TSP and CPP algorithms to construct an optimistic plan for collecting more data within a certain range and limiting energy restrictions.We designed a fish existence prediction scenario to verify the novel system in both simulation experiments and field experiments. The novel aquaculture environment monitoring system significantly reduces the burden of manual operation in the fishery inspection field. Additionally, the simplicity of the sensor setup and the minimal cost of the platform enables its other possible applications in aquatic exploration and commercial utilization.

Multi-Contact Motion Retargeting using Whole-body Optimization of Full Kinematics and Sequential Force Equilibrium

This paper presents a multi-contact motion adaptation framework that enables teleoperation of high degree-of-freedom (DoF) robots, such as quadrupeds and humanoids, for loco-manipulation tasks in multi-contact settings. Our proposed algorithms optimize whole-body configurations and formulate the retargeting of multi-contact motions as sequential quadratic programming, which is robust and stable near the edges of feasibility constraints. Our framework allows real-time operation of the robot and reduces cognitive load for the operator because infeasible commands are automatically adapted into physically stable and viable motions on the robot. The results in simulations with full dynamics demonstrated the effectiveness of teleoperating different legged robots interactively and generating rich multi-contact movements. We evaluated the computational efficiency of the proposed algorithms, and further validated and analyzed multi-contact loco-manipulation tasks on humanoid and quadruped robots by reaching, active pushing and various traversal on uneven terrains.

Learning Perceptual Locomotion on Uneven Terrains using Sparse Visual Observations

Legged robots have achieved remarkable performance in blind walking using either model-based control or data-driven deep reinforcement learning. To proactively navigate and traverse various terrains, active use of visual perception becomes indispensable, and this work aims to exploit the use of sparse visual observations to achieve perceptual locomotion over a range of commonly seen bumps, ramps, and stairs in human-centred environments. We first formulate the selection of minimal visual input that can represent the uneven surfaces of interest, and propose a learning framework that integrates such exteroceptive and proprioceptive data. We specifically select state observations and design a training curriculum to learn feedback control policies more effectively over a range of different terrains. Using an extensive benchmark, we validate the learned policy in tasks that require omnidirectional walking over flat ground and forward locomotion over terrains with obstacles, showing a high success rate of traversal. Particularly, the robot performs autonomous perceptual locomotion with minimal visual perception using depth measurements, which are easily available from a Lidar or RGB-D sensor, and successfully demonstrates robust ascent and descent over high stairs of 20 cm step height, i.e., 50% of its leg length.

Deep Pairwise Learning To Rank For Search Autocomplete

Autocomplete (a.k.a "Query Auto-Completion", "AC") suggests full queries based on a prefix typed by customer. Autocomplete has been a core feature of commercial search engine. In this paper, we propose a novel context-aware neural network based pairwise ranker (DeepPLTR) to improve AC ranking, DeepPLTR leverages contextual and behavioral features to rank queries by minimizing a pairwise loss, based on a fully-connected neural network structure. Compared to LambdaMART ranker, DeepPLTR shows +3.90% MeanReciprocalRank (MRR) lift in offline evaluation, and yielded +0.06% (p < 0.1) Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) lift in an Amazon's online A/B experiment.

Multi-expert learning of adaptive legged locomotion

Achieving versatile robot locomotion requires motor skills which can adapt to previously unseen situations. We propose a Multi-Expert Learning Architecture (MELA) that learns to generate adaptive skills from a group of representative expert skills. During training, MELA is first initialised by a distinct set of pre-trained experts, each in a separate deep neural network (DNN). Then by learning the combination of these DNNs using a Gating Neural Network (GNN), MELA can acquire more specialised experts and transitional skills across various locomotion modes. During runtime, MELA constantly blends multiple DNNs and dynamically synthesises a new DNN to produce adaptive behaviours in response to changing situations. This approach leverages the advantages of trained expert skills and the fast online synthesis of adaptive policies to generate responsive motor skills during the changing tasks. Using a unified MELA framework, we demonstrated successful multi-skill locomotion on a real quadruped robot that performed coherent trotting, steering, and fall recovery autonomously, and showed the merit of multi-expert learning generating behaviours which can adapt to unseen scenarios.

Learning natural locomotion behaviors for humanoid robots using human knowledge

This paper presents a new learning framework that leverages the knowledge from imitation learning, deep reinforcement learning, and control theories to achieve human-style locomotion that is natural, dynamic, and robust for humanoids. We proposed novel approaches to introduce human bias, i.e. motion capture data and a special Multi-Expert network structure. We used the Multi-Expert network structure to smoothly blend behavioral features, and used the augmented reward design for the task and imitation rewards. Our reward design is composable, tunable, and explainable by using fundamental concepts from conventional humanoid control. We rigorously validated and benchmarked the learning framework which consistently produced robust locomotion behaviors in various test scenarios. Further, we demonstrated the capability of learning robust and versatile policies in the presence of disturbances, such as terrain irregularities and external pushes.