Leonel Pena

Undergraduate Researcher

About Me


Howdy!

I am a rising junior attending the University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley in Edinburg TX. I am majoring in Computer Science and am planning on completing my Master's degree before moving on. This is my second year at Texas A&M College Station and the DREU program.

This is my second year at Parasol Labs and part of the Distributed Research Experience for Undergraduates, better known as the DREU program. This program allows for undergraduates to get a sense of how research works and allows them to take part in some themselves by interning at select institutions. During the summer of 2016 I interned at Texas A&M Parasol Labs for 10 weeks and worked with Dr. Nancy Amato along with Saurabh Mishra and Read Sandstrom. All of my work is viewable here.

Having fun at Texas A&M!


One of our first meetings with Shawna presenting
Tim helping out when we had a problem
Eating at Taco Bell during lunch
Eating out during our first week here.
An impromptu meeting in Parasol Labs
Playing Risk our first week here (I was eating an M&M)
Making pancakes for the NBA finals
Meet-up with some friends when I went back home a weekend

Final Project Files

Final Paper Final Poster Final Website Tar

Research Plan


Project Overview

With motion planning (the problem relating to finding the best path from a start and an end) growing into more and more fields, better methods of simulating and finding the best way for a robot to make a valid paths are needed. This may sound easier than what it really is, as motion planning is so broad, research is needed in order to properly implement it. If robots have multiple degrees of freedom, the problem grows even more difficult. This is why the Parasol Motion Planning Library (PMPL) was developed.

Project Goals and Implications

The goal of this project is to demonstrate the capabilities that PMPL has by running several scenarios in a simulator. There are many different scenarios that PMPL can solve, ranging from 2D to 3D environments. This is being conducted to show individuals in other areas not particularly related to Motion Planning how it works and how it can solve many different problems.

Approach

  • Learn the Parasol Lab's software tools for research including PMPL (for motion planning), VIZMO (for visualization), the simulator, and GForge (for group code collaboration).
  • Learn basics of motion planning, mesh files and visualization.
  • Testing and visual analysis of the changes.
  • Document the changes in form of a paper.
  • Preparing and presenting a poster.
  • Personal Goals

    This project is also being used to further our own understanding of programming and give us experience with the terminal and the programming languages involved. On top of that, this summer research experience allows us to understand the life of a Ph.D. student and take a peek into what our lives could potentially be like. On top of that, it allows us to perform groundbreaking research which would surely open more doors for us.

    My Skills

    C++

    95%

    Web Design

    80%

    Java

    70%

    2
    Research Internships
    2
    Projects
    5+
    Qualifications

    My Mentors and Co-Workers

    Avatar

    Nancy Amato. Unocal Professor/Parasol Labs Co-Director

    Nancy Amato is a Co-Chair of the Computing Research Association for Women and has inspired me to pursue an education above just a Bachelor's. She is part of the DREU program that has brought me here and has given me many opportunities these past 2 years.



    Avatar

    Irving Solis. Ph.D. Student

    Irving is our resident mentor this summer and has been a great help for us. He is always there whenever we need help, even if it's detracting from his time. He has taught us much about programming and furthered my interest in pursuing a Master's and even a Ph.D.


    Avatar

    Marcos Pena. Co-Worker:Computer Engineering Major

    Marcos Pena has been a good friend of mine for 4 years now and has participated in both of my internships here at Texas A&M.



    Avatar

    Brandon Martinez. Co-Worker:Computer Science Major

    Brandon Martinez has been a good friend of mine for 4 years now and has participated in both of my internships here at Texas A&M.



    Weekly Reports

    • Week 1 (May 30 - June 2)
    • Howdy, after another year we are back in Parasol labs ready to start work on a new project with Dr.Nancy Amato and Irving this summer. This week has mostly been spent on finishing the crash course and setting up our accounts for the computers and NetID’s. We have begun work on the website and are updating it as much as possible along with our research plans that have been asked from us by Shawna.
    • Tuesday

      -We checked out our keys with Sibba and took our pictures as well.
      -Arrived at the office and met the other interns along with our mentor Irving.
      -Started the first section of the crash course that had to do with.
      -Finished the first section of the crash course
      -Started second section of the crash course

    • Wednesday

      -Started on the PMPL section of the crash course
      -Signed up for GForge
      -Started working on the website
      -Had a meeting with all the mentors and interns introducing ourselves
      -Learned about the other projects being worked on in the lab

    • Thursday

      -Continued working on the crash course by reading the required materials
      -Continued updating our websites
      -As I was still waiting on my NetID to sign into a computer locally, I worked on our report
      -We explained a few concepts such as Degrees of Freedom and C-Space to our companions .

    • Friday

      -Finished the Research plan asked from Shawna -Finished my website -Had a meeting where we went over the discussion questions on the crash course -Worked on weekly outline.

    • Week 2 (June 5 - June 9)
    • After last week being spent on the crash course, a new challenge was a fresh start for us this week. This week we were tasked with using the simulator and implementing different problems into it to see how they worked out. We’re hoping to implement different types of planners and algorithms to see how differently they react to to our environments.
    • Monday

      -Continued to work on the crash course
      -Made several objects in terminal and learned how they worked
      -Met with Irving and talked a bit about what we were going to be doing

    • Tuesday

      -Had a mini meeting with interns and mentors on Tuesday with Dr. Amato once she returned
      -Finished the crash course up to chapter three due to our speedy initialization of our next project
      -Met with our project mates and started on our project for the summer
      -Played some risk with Diego, Brandon, and Marcos in the evening after attempting to watch a movie.

    • Wednesday

      -Had a meeting with all the mentors in the conference room
      -Learned about all the other projects being worked on by our colleagues in Parasol Labs
      -Had our websites critiqued and took notes on what to work on
      -Ate Double Dave’s Pizza
      -Watched Game 3 of the NBA finals at the Stack and was delighted that the Warriors won because there will be free taco’s at Taco Bells

    • Thursday

      -Made shapes with triangularization
      -Made environments to test our problems on
      -We could finally implement our findings into actual problems

    • Friday

      -Extensively made many .obj files for our environments
      -Updated the website with pictures in the weekly reports
      -Began working in the 2D environment after finishing our tasks in 3D
      -Used GForge to report bugs and learned how to navigate it

    • Week 3 (June 12 - June 16)
    • Howdy Dr. Amato, after last week being spent on a 3D environment, we finally finished the 2D environment and finished my personal website. This week we attended a plethora of presentations such as the online seminar and a presentation on multi-threading. We are now working with the Kuka robot trying to make it work in our environment.
    • Sunday

      -Came in to work on my personal Website as I had broken it the Friday before hand.

    • Monday

      -Simulated several different strategies in a 3D environment
      -Made a copy of the environment in Vizmo for easier visualization while we worked on bugs
      -Got a weekly plan from Irving on what to do
      -Saw the final game of the NBA Finals with Diego, Brandon, and Marcos

    • Tuesday

      -Helped Mukulika and Diane setting up their monitors
      -Kept running different strategies on the simulator
      -Attended the CRA-W town meeting hosted by Dr. Amato

    • Wednesday

      -Completed the Exercise 2-1 which is a rotational scenario
      -Moved my personal website from Wix.com to the Parasol site
      -Tried to make the "Contact Me" and the map section of the website work

    • Thursday

      -I finally got Google Maps to work by getting an API key from Google
      -Got the Contact Us form to work by using "Formspree.io"
      -Fixed a few errors in our scenarios
      -Attended a weekly meeting where Mukulika presented her work.
      -Attended a presentation about multi-threading on the 3rd floor.

    • Friday

      -Fixed our environments for the 2D and 3D environments, as the bug that had the robot spawn at the origin was fixed
      -Started work on a fixed manipulator robot
      -Started to debug the Kuka robot, as it wasn't working

    • Week 4 (June 19 - June 23)
    • Howdy, this week was mostly spent on running several different strategies in the simulator and creating Vizmo environments for the Kuka robot while it was being fixed for the simulator. We made 2 environments specifically, one where the base of the robot was the main focus in the path-finding algorithm, and one where the arm was the main focus.
    • Monday

      -Attended orientation at UTRGV and signed up for classes

    • Tuesday

      -Started to track all the different MP Strategies in a spreadsheet
      -Kept running different simulations all day until we had what we needed
      -Went to Ye Stat buffet with Irving, Diego, Brandon, and Marcos

    • Wednesday

      -Completed the simulations and input their data in the spreadsheet
      -Started working on an environment with the Kuka robot that focused on a translational and rotational challenge for the base
      -Attended the weekly meeting where Shawna and Tim showcased MAPRM and how they used witnesses to determine the Medial Axis in the environment
      -Had our websites critiqued and edited them later on in the day

    • Thursday

      -We started an environment that was more focused on arm translation and rotation instead of the base
      -We edited the existing environment that was for the base to be used on the arm
      -Found and fixed a bug where we would get an incorrect path that would collide with obstacles

    • Friday

      -We finished the environment to make the arm translational and rotational
      -Took some time to do the weekly report
      -Went to lunch with Diane and Mukulika























    • Week 5 (June 26 - June 30)
    • This week was a lot of fun. We discovered several problems with our environment and were able to fix them after some trouble shooting. Besides that, we did a report on an environment and how different strategies performed in them. While I would have loved to use a more conventional text editor, learning LaTeX was an eye-opening experience. I am sure we will use it again later on this summer. Attached you will find the report I worked on.
    • Monday

      -Worked on my website to update it to include the week 4 report
      -Went to work on our Kuka environments, but the arm broke apart for some reason
      -Tried to figure out why the Kuka was not working, troubleshooting it.

    • Tuesday

      -Kept working on the Kuka environments
      -Discovered that the arm would break apart if obstacles were too close to it
      -Made a new environment as a result and tested the motion planning strategies on it

    • Wednesday

      -Brandon discovered that any changes made to the environment file in Vizmo would save the orientation and angles of obstacles differently, causing an object that was saved in a good location to be spun at a different angle and interfering with the Kuka arm.
      -As a result, when we wanted to make a change to the environment file, we had to copy the coordinates of the obstacles to save manually and reopen again in Vizmo
      -Had our websites critiqued at the weekly meeting.

    • Thursday

      -We got a new assignment form Irving, test all of the Motion Planning strategies an write a report by Friday on them
      -Was assigned an exercise each.
      -Learned how to use LaTeX and started writing the report

    • Friday

      -Worked on the report all day
      -Ran simulations to collect data
      -Worked on our weekly report

    • Week 6 (July 3 - July 7)
    • This week was a lot of fun. We finished our DREU report this week and worked on our website to migrate our things over when the topic was brought up during our weekly meeting with Sascha. We did discover a problem with the simulator on Friday where the simulation would work the second time, but not the third or first time. Overall, this was a productive week with our websites and environments.
    • Monday

      -Worked on my website to update it to include the week 5 report
      -Since we had finished our reports, we went back to working with the Kuka environments
      -Worked on DREU report

    • Tuesday

      -Saw Fireworks for Fourth of July
      -Ate Hot Dogs

    • Wednesday

      -Attended the weekly meeting with Sascha presenting about disassembly
      -Was told to remove everything from our Parasol website and move it over to our personal site
      -Worked on the website to migrate everything
      -Kept working on the environments
      -Met with Nancy in the afternoon and discussed the environments and our DREU report
      -Kept working on the environment and showed Irving our work on the Kuka environments

    • Thursday

      -Kept migrating our info to the other website
      -Finished the Kuka environments to show Irving
      -Finished migrating our information to the other website

    • Friday

      -Was told by Irving to start a report about the Kuka environments
      -When we showed the completed environments to Irving, he decided to make a few changes to it so we did
      -When we ran the simulations, the simulator would not solve the problem on the first try, but would on the second try
      -• Decided to start our reports next week after the problem was fixed

    • Week 7 (July 10 - July 14)
    • This week was very productive. On top of finishing our websites to have a separate one from the Parasol one, we started working with car-like robots and started to write our reports for the simulations executed beforehand. With our reports needing many different simulations, we graciously had Andrew help us and told us how to work a script he made that would run 10 trials of the strategies we needed. So that was a huge weight taken off our shoulders. After work, we went to Carney’s bar and grill with some people from the office and chatted and got to know each other. Overall, this was a fun and productive week.
    • Monday

      -Had our websites completely updated to the standards Nancy gave us
      -Attended weekly meeting with Diane about computational biology
      -Kept testing the simulations for our reports
      -Had Irving assign us a car-like robot

    • Tuesday

      -Updated our xml file to implement the new code that Irving gave us
      -Started working on the car-like robot code
      -Tim and Read helped us with the problems we were having in the xml file

    • Wednesday

      -Made our robot smaller and changed its format
      -Made the environment less complex
      -I talked to Irving about adding more actuators to the robot xml to make its movement more favorable
      -Made another robot that was a triangle instead of a square
      -Began running tests and statistics

    • Thursday

      -Kept running simulations on the car-like robot to test whether the standard actuators were better than those I implemented
      -In some scenarios, the new actuators were better than the originals, but in some cases, they were horrible
      -Was told about the report due Monday.

    • Friday

      -Got our template from Irving for our reports due Monday.
      -Began running our simulations for our strategies
      -Added code that output the path length
      -Andrew graciously gave us a script that would run our simulations 10 times for us and give us the averages we needed for our report
      -Went to Carneys with some Mentors such as Sascha, Time, Andrew, and Irving along with some of the other interns at Parasol Labs

    • Week 8 (July 17 - July 21)
    • This week was very productive. We had our first meeting about the posters and received feedback on what to change and applied those changes later on this week. In more exciting news, we finally got the robot to mirror what happens in the simulator almost perfectly. After working for a couple of days with Irving, we made some videos showing the similarities between the simulator and the robot. The link to watch them is linked here
    • Saturday

      -I went to the office to run some simulations and tests since we had a paper to turn in the following Monday.

    • Sunday

      -I went to the office again to run more simulations, but ended up talking to Irving about the poster and our future for the project.

    • Monday

      -Updated my website to include last week’s report
      -Attended weekly meeting where we discussed the posters and summer projects
      -Got feedback on what to change in the poster
      -Irving told us about running simulations and having those same actions occur with the robot in Parasol Labs

    • Tuesday

      -We measured the office and made a replica of it in an environment file we could use to run our tests on and have the same results in the real world.
      -We worked on the robot and the simulator, trying to have the robot’s actions match those of the simulator.

    • Wednesday

      -Made more fine tune adjustments to the robot in order to make it more in line with what we had in the simulator.
      -Helped out Brandon work on the poster alongside with Irving and Marcos

    • Thursday

      -Kept running simulations on the robot and simulator until we nearly perfected the representation of the simulation in the real world -We then moved on to a more difficult query and the robot still performed like the simulation did. -Filmed the robot doing multiple queries for a video showing how accurate the robot is.

    • Friday

      -Finished filming the robot in the lab and spliced together the video of the simulator to portray how accurate the robot is in the real world compared to the simulator.
      -Worked some more on the poster, adding more details in certain regions that required it.
      -Worked on the final report for a bit, getting some preliminary results.


    • Week 9 (June 24 - June 28)
    • This week has been very hectic, as we are approaching our final week here and are finishing up our poster for the symposium next week. On top of running tests and measuring results, we also worked on a final report and attended a talk by Wookho Son on virtual reality and how he is applying it to several different fields, I really enjoyed it and was sort of disappointed he did not have any more time.
    • Monday

      -Updated my website to include last week’s report
      -Worked on the poster and kept revising it.
      -We also worked on the final report required from us.

    • Tuesday

      -We kept working on our poster, adding and removing things as we thought necessary
      -Kept working on the final report.
      -Retook pictures for the poster as they were not very representative of the environment.

    • Wednesday

      -Attended Weekly meeting where we went over posters
      -Was given feedback on what should be changed on the poster.
      -Made appropriate changes and emailed the result to Nancy, Shawna, and Irving.

    • Thursday

      -Started running tests for final results
      -Worked on the final report some more
      -Added the final results to the poster once they were done.

    • Friday

      -When Shawna replied to us about some changes, we made the changes necessary.
      -Attended the talk by Wookho Son about Virtual Reality
      -Showed him our work in Parasol Labs when he was being shown around by Nancy.

    • Week 10 (July 31 - August 4)
    • This week was our last here at Parasol Labs. Our poster symposium went well, and although we did not place, it was certainly a great experience, as it allowed me to hone my presentation skills and learn more about other fields and what is being worked on there. Overall, I want to give great thanks to Parasol Labs, Texas A&M, and Nancy Amato for giving us this great opportunity once again. There are no words to describe the gratitude I have for these people to have given me this great opportunity. This was a fun summer!
    • Monday

      -Attended weekly meeting where we received feedback on our posters.
      -Went to work on our posters after the critiquing of the meeting.
      -Showed our work to Nancy after making desired changes and had more critiques.

    • Tuesday

      -Kept working on the poster based on the critiques of the meeting and Nancy.
      -Had a small meeting with Nancy to look at our posters and offered more advice.
      -Continued working on Paper where needed.

    • Wednesday

      -Worked on report with Irving as much as possible.
      -Added the abstract Nancy corrected and approved for Jonathan to the Final Report.
      -Updated our websites.

    • Thursday

      -Worked on poster as needed and made final revisions.
      -Worked on paper as needed and made final revisions.
      -Updated our websites.

    • Friday

      -Attended the poster symposium.
      -Presented our research over the summer.
      -Said our final goodbye's to the Parasol staff.

    Contact Me


    College Station, TX

    Email:leopena117@gmail.com

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