Dr. Abdulla Al-Kaff

Position: Assistant Professor
Email: akaff[at]ing.uc3m.es
Telephone: telephone
Address: Calle Butarque 15, 28911 Leganés, Madrid
Office: 1.03.B13

Brief Bio

Abdulla Al-Kaff is an Assistant Professor and Senior Researcher at the Intelligent Systems Laboratory (LSI), Department of Systems Engineering and Automation, Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, with a solid theoretical and mathematical background in the fields of Artificial Vision, Artificial Intelligence, and localization algorithms for Intelligent Systems and Automotive ground and aerial vehicles.
He graduated from Aden University in Computer Science and Engineering in 2007 with a grade (Very good) and ranked as the third in his class, and obtained his master degree in Robotics and Automation with grade (Excellent) in 2012 from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, where he obtained his Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering, Electronics, and Automation in 2017 with a grade (Excellent with Cum Laude), with a thesis titled "Vision-based navigation system for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)", which proposed a robust navigation system; in order to allow the UAVs to perform complex tasks autonomously and in real-time. The proposed algorithms deal with solving the navigation problem for outdoor as well as indoor environments, mainly based on visual information that is captured by monocular cameras. In addition, this dissertation presents the advantages of using the visual sensors as the main source of data or complementing other sensors in providing useful information; in order to improve the accuracy and the robustness of the sensing purposes.
During his Ph.D., Abdulla got a European patent in designing a UAV with an advanced visual system for the inspection for the defects in buildings and infrastructures.
In addition, Abdulla was awarded as a best Ph.D. thesis in Spain in Intelligent Transportation systems.
His current research interests focused on computer vision, deep learning, trajectories planning, control engineering, intelligent systems, autonomous vehicles, and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), and he has a lot of the publications in these fields.
Research Interests:
  • Computer Vision
  • Deep and Machine Learning
  • Control Systems
  • Intelligent Systems
  • Autonomous Vehicles
  • Unmanned Aerials Vehicles

Projects

Projects ...

Awards

Research
  1. Best PhD Thesis in the IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society (Spanish Chapter), September 2018.
  2. Best paper Award in computer vision presented in XXXVIII Jornadas de Automática, 2017.
  3. Co-author of Best Student Paper Award in the 10th International Conference on Service Operations and Logistics, and Informatics (SOLI2015, IEEE).

Competition
  1. 3rd place award team, Minesweepers Competition 2018 - IEEE Robotics and Automation Society IROS- Madrid, Spain, October 2018.
  2. Arabic Digital Content (UN-ESCWA) Competition. Yemen, 2008.

Selected Publications

Journals
  1.  Vision-Based Guidance System for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), Abdulla Al-Kaff, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, Integrated Computer-Aided Engineering, 2019. (In Press)
  2. An Appearance-Based Tracking Algorithm for Aerial Search and Rescue Purposes, Abdulla Al-Kaff, María José Gómez-Silva, Francisco Miguel Moreno, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, Journal of Expert Systems with Applications, Vol.19, pp: 652, 2019.
  3. SUAFF: Scalable Unmanned Aerial Fire Fighter - Concept and Prototype, Angel Madridano Carrasco, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Pablo Flores Peña, Juan Carlos Marín Cano, David Martín Gómez, Arturo de la Escalera, Técnica Aeronáutica, Atlanta, Vol.2, pp: 9-16, 2018.
  4. Survey of Computer Vision Algorithms and Applications for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Abdulla Al-Kaff, David Martin, Fernando Garcia, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, Journal of Expert Systems with Applications, Vol.92, pp: 447-463, 2018.
  5. Obstacle Detection and Avoidance System Based on Monocular Camera and Size Expansion Algorithm for UAVs, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Fernando Garcia, David Martin, Arturo de La Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, Sensors, Volume 17, Issue 5, 2017.
  6. IVVI 2.0: An intelligent vehicle based on computational perception, David Martin, Fernando Garcia, Basam Musleh, Daniel Olmeda, Gustavo Pelaez, Pablo Marin, Aurelio Ponz, Cesar Rodriguez, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Arturo de la Escalera and Jose Maria Armingol, Expert Systems with Applications, Volume 41, Issue 17, 2014.
  7. Enhancing Engineering Learning through SPOC Courses, Fernando Garcia; David Martin; Arturo De La Escalera; Jose Maria Armingol; Abdulla Al Kaff, The International Journal of Technologies in Learning, Volume 23, Issue 3, pp.15-20, September 2016.
  8. Low-Cost 3D Vision-Based System for Post-Stork Arm Rehabilitation using RGB-d Camera, Abdulla Al-Kaff, INFOCOMP Journal of Computer Science, vol.14, pp:1-12.
 
Book Chapters
  1. ROS-based Approach for Unmanned Vehicles in Civil Applications, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Francisco Miguel Moreno, and Ahmed Hussein, Angel Madridano Carrasco, David Marin, and Arturo de La Escalera, Robot Operating System (ROS) - The Complete Reference (Volume 3), 2018.
  2. Design a Mobile Robot as a Robotic Entertainment Pet for disabled persons, Raul Perula Martinez; Abdulla Al-Kaff; Juan Miguel Garcia Haro, (Spanish Version), Book Chapter, 11th workshop RoboCity2030 (Robots Sociales), Madrid, 2013.
  3. Modeling and Implementation of an Entertainment Robot for competition, Raul Perula Matinez; Juan Miguel Garcia Haro; Abdulla Al-Kaff, (Spanish Version), Book Chapter, 11th workshop RoboCity2030 (Robots Sociales), Madrid, 2013.
 
Conferences 
  1. Multisensor Fusion Multisensor Fusion Localization using Extended H-infinity Filter using Pre-filtered Sensors Measurements, Mostafa Elsaid Abdelaziz Osman, Ricardo Alonso Cortizo, Ahmed Hammam, Francisco Miguel Moreno, Abdulla Al-Kaff and Ahmed Hussein, 30th IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV 2019), June 9-12, 2019, Paris, France.
  2. ROS-Based   Architecture   for   Multiple   Unmanned   Vehicles (UXVs) Formation, Raul Sosa San Frutos, Abdulla Al Kaff, Ahmed Hussein, International Conference on Computer Aided Systems Theory, EUROCAST’15, February 17-22, 2019, Canary Islands, Spain.
  3. Hand Gesture Recognition Using Computer Vision Applied to Colombian Sign Language, I. C. Triviño-Lopez, C. H. Rodríguez-Garavito, and Abdulla Al Kaff, International Conference on Computer Aided Systems Theory, EUROCAST’15, February 17-22, 2019, Canary Islands, Spain.
  4. Simulator for Planning Collision-Free Trajectories in Manipulation of Objects Applications, Juan S. Martínez-Caldas, C. H. Rodríguez-Garavito, Carolina Peña-Ortega, Álvaro A. Patiño-Forero, Guillermo A. Camacho, and Abdulla Al Kaff, International Conference on Computer Aided Systems Theory, EUROCAST’15, February 17-22, 2019, Canary Islands, Spain.
  5. SkyOnyx: Autonomous UAV Research Platform for Air Transportation System (ATSys), Abdulla Al-Kaff, Ricardo Alonso, Mostafa Elsaid Abdelaziz Osman and Ahmed Hussein, The 21st IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems, November 4-7, 2018, Maui, Hawaii, USA
  6. Hybrid V2X Communication Approach using WiFi and 4G Connections, Bahae Abidi, Francisco Miguel Moreno, Mohamed El Haziti, Ahmed Hussein, Abdulla Al Kaff and David Martin Gomez, IEEE International Conference on Vehicular Electronics and Safety (ICVES), September 12-14, 2018, Madrid, Spain
  7. Intelligent Online Adaptive Covariance Estimation Approach for Multiple Odometry Sensors Fusion, Mostafa Osman, Ahmed Hussein, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Fernando García and José María Armingol, The 29th IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV), June 26-29, 2018, Chang Shu, China
  8. Intelligent Vehicle for Search, Rescue and Transportation Purposes, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Francisco Miguel Moreno, Arturo de La Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, The 15th IEEE International Symposium on Safety, Security, and Rescue Robotics (SSRR 2017), October 11-13, 2017, Shanghai, China
  9. Aerial Image Mosaicking for Multi-purpose Civil Applications, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Juan Camilo Soto Trivino, Raul Sosa San Frutos, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, Third Iberian Robotics Conference, November 22-24, 2017, Sevilla, Spain.
  10. Homography-Based Navigation System for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Arturo de La Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, Advanced Concepts for Intelligent Vision Systems, September 18-21, 2017, Antwerp, Belgium.
  11. VBII-UAV: Vision-based Infrastructure Inspection-UAV, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Francisco Miguel Moreno, Luis Javier San Jose, Fernando Garcia, David Martin, Arturo de la Escalera, Alberto Nieva, and Jose Luis Mena García, World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies, Springer, April 11-13, 2017, Porto Santo, Madeira, Portugal.
  12. Monocular Vision-based Obstacle Detection/Avoidance for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Qinggang Meng, David Martin, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol, 2016 IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV). IEEE, June 19-22, 2016, Gothenburg, Sweden.
  13. Autonomous Indoor Navigation of Low-cost Quadcopters, Ahmed Hussein, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol. IEEE International Conference on Service Operations and Logistics, and Informatics (SOLI), November 15-17, 2015, Tunisia.
  14. SIFT and SURF Performance Evaluation and the Effect of FREAK Descriptor in the Context of Visual Odometry for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Arturo de la Escalera, and Jose Maria Armingol. International Conference on Computer Aided Systems Theory, EUROCAST’15, Springer, February 10-15, 2015, Canary Islands, Spain.
  15. A human-based genetic algorithm applied to the problem of learning in-hand manipulation tasks, Javier Gonzalez Quijano; Mohamed Abderrahim; Choukri Bensalah; Abdulla Al-Kaff, IROS 2012 workshop: Beyond Robot Grasping - Modern Approaches for Learning Dynamic Manipulation, October 7-12, 2012, Villamoura, Portugal.
  16. Hybrid Model for Human Skin based on HSV and YCrCb Color Spaces, Abdulla Al-Kaff and Mohamed Abderrahim, (Poster), International IEEE Intelligent Vehicles Symposium Workshops, June 3-7, 2012, Alcala de Henares, Spain.
  17. Human Face and Hand Detection for Human-Robot Interaction using RGB-D Kinect Sensor, Abdulla Al-Kaff, Silvia Rodríguez-Jiménez, Choukri Bensalah, Javier González-Quijano & Mohamed Abderrahim, (Poster), 5th International Conference on Cognitive Systems, COGSYS'2012, February 22-23, 2012, Vienna, Austria.
  18. 3D Visual Perception System for Grasping with an Anthropomorphic Hand, (Poster) - 5th International Conference on Cognitive Systems, COGSYS'2012, Vienna, 2012.
  19. RoMPLA Robot Motion Planning and Learning Architecture, (Poster) - 5th International Conference on Cognitive Systems, COGSYS'2012, February 22-23, 2012, Vienna, Austria.

Theses

  1. Vision-Based Navigation System for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Ph.D.
  2. Low-Cost 3D Vision-Based System for Human Arm Motion Analysis Using RGB-D Kinect Sensor, M.Sc.
  3. Smart House, B.Sc.

Patents

EUROPEAN PATENT
  1. A system and a method for surface aerial inspection, Patent No. 16382353.7-1504

Organizing Activities

  1. Program Chair, 21th IEEE International Conference on Vehicular Electronics and Safety (ICVES’2019), Cairo, Egypt, September 2019.
  2. Program Chair, 20th IEEE International Conference on Vehicular Electronics and Safety (ICVES’2018), Madrid, Spain, September 2018.
  3. Local organization member in the Minesweepers: Towards a Landmine-free World competition - IEEE Robotics and Automation Society IROS- Madrid, Spain, October 2018.
  4. Program Committee, 5th World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies (WorldCist'17), Porto Santo Island, Madeira, Portugal, April 2017.
  5. Local organization member, RoboCity2030, Robots Sociales Workshop, Madrid, Spain, 2013.
  6. Local organization member, RoboCity12 Meeting, Madrid, Spain, 2012.
  7. Local organization member, Arabic Digital Content (UN-ESCWA) Competition, Aden, Yemen, 2008.

Journal/Conference Reviewer

Associate Editor
  • IEEE International Conference on Vehicular Electronics and Safety.
Reviewer
  • Robot Operating System (ROS), Volume 3, Springer book.
  • Journal of Intelligent & Robotic Systems.
  • Journal of Visual Communication and Image Representation.
  • International Journal of Robotics and Automation.
  • IEEE Transactions on Cybernetics.
  • IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems.
  • World Conference on Information Systems and Technologies.
  • IEEE International Conference on Vehicular Electronics and Safety.
  • International Symposium on Safety, Security and Rescue Robotics (SSRR).
  • IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITSC).

Teaching

Teaching ...
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