Laboratory Notebook

Welcome to the Physical AI Laboratory. This is a living document of experiments in Reinforcement Learning, Robotics, and Simulation.

Recent Posts

Nudge: Building an Ambient AI Coach at the Omi Hackathon

How we turned a wearable mic into a real-time SOP compliance system — and then made it work for families too
AI
Hackathon
Wearable
Omi
FastAPI
Claude
Real-Time
What if every human interaction could be a little better? Not through surveillance — through a gentle nudge.
Feb 11, 2026
Rajesh

Lesson 4: ACT - Action Chunking with Transformers

The Architecture That Made Imitation Learning Work
robot-learning
imitation-learning
transformers
act-policy
bootcamp
In this lesson, we decode ACT (Action Chunking with Transformers) - the policy that proved imitation learning can work on low-cost hardware. By the end, you’ll understand…
Jan 15, 2026
Rajesh

Lesson 3: The Transformer Revolution

The Architecture That Changed Everything
robot-learning
transformers
vision-transformers
attention
In this lesson, we unlock the transformer architecture - the breakthrough that powers ChatGPT, modern robot policies, and nearly every frontier AI system. By the end, you’ll…
Jan 11, 2026
Rajesh

Lesson 2: Understanding Policy Learning

From Point Estimates to Probability Distributions
robot-learning
deep-generative-models
VAE
lesson-2
In this lesson, we discover why predicting a single action fails for robots, and how thinking in probability distributions unlocks the power of modern robot learning.
Jan 4, 2026
Rajesh

Lesson 1: Why Can’t Robots Fold Your Clothes?

Robot Learning Bootcamp
Robot Learning
Imitation Learning
Course
Bootcamp
🎧 Prefer to listen? Experience this lesson as an immersive classroom audio.
Dec 28, 2025
Rajesh

Creating Go2W USD: The Right Tool for the Job

A Journey from Manual pxr API to Isaac Lab’s UrdfConverter
newton
usd
isaac-lab
go2-w
physical-ai
tutorial
This tutorial is guided by Dr. Nova Brooks, your AI mentor for robotics and simulation.
Dec 24, 2025
Rajesh

NVIDIA Newton Physics: GPU-Accelerated Simulation for Physical AI

nvidia
newton
physics-simulation
physical-ai
isaac-lab
workshop
Hands-on workshop exploring NVIDIA’s Newton physics engine, Cosmos world foundation models, and the Isaac ecosystem for training embodied AI agents
Dec 20, 2025
Rajesh

Go2-W Sim-to-Real: Deploying Hybrid Locomotion

ROSCon India 2025 Workshop Prep - Part 4 of 4
isaac-sim
isaac-lab
sim-to-real
go2-w
jetson
tensorrt
roscon-india
Deploying a hybrid wheel-leg policy is more complex than standard quadruped deployment. The sim-to-real gap includes:
Dec 18, 2025
Rajesh

Isaac Sim vs Isaac Lab: Understanding the Stack

ROSCon India 2025 Workshop Prep - Part 1 of 4
isaac-sim
isaac-lab
go2-w
unitree
workshop
roscon-india
Before diving into Go2-W training, let’s clarify the NVIDIA stack—because the naming can be confusing:
Dec 18, 2025
Rajesh

Go2-W ROS 2 Interface: Wheel + Leg Control

ROSCon India 2025 Workshop Prep - Part 2 of 4
ros2
isaac-sim
isaac-lab
go2-w
unitree
workshop
roscon-india
The Go2-W requires a more complex ROS 2 interface than standard quadrupeds due to its 16 joints (12 leg + 4 wheel) and hybrid control modes.
Dec 18, 2025
Rajesh

Training Go2-W: Hybrid Wheel-Leg Locomotion Policy

ROSCon India 2025 Workshop Prep - Part 3 of 4
isaac-sim
isaac-lab
reinforcement-learning
go2-w
unitree
roscon-india
Training the Go2-W is fundamentally different from training standard quadrupeds. The policy must learn to:
Dec 18, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 3: Official Zenoh Image Deep Dive

Exploring Zettascale’s ROSCon 2025 Docker Environment
ros2
zenoh
workshop
roscon-india
docker
comparison
Tonight, we received an email from the ROSCon India 2025 workshop organizers with a simple instruction:
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 4 Preview: Understanding yDx.M - What Yaanendriya Adds

Part 4 of 4: From DIY VIO to Production-Grade IMU Solutions
ros2
imu
perception
workshop
roscon-india
yaanendriya
ydxm
Over the past three posts, we experienced the full problem domain with real measurements:
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 4 Preview: Fusion - The Best of Both Worlds

Part 3 of 4: Building Robust Visual-Inertial Odometry with the D435i
ros2
vio
slam
perception
workshop
roscon-india
realsense
d435i
sensor-fusion
The key insight: IMU and vision have opposite failure modes!
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 4 Preview: Vision Alone - When the Camera Goes Blind

Part 2 of 4: Why Visual Odometry Fails and What IMU Can’t See
ros2
visual-odometry
perception
workshop
roscon-india
realsense
d435i
rtabmap
In Part 1, we experienced the limitations of IMU-only sensing:
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 4 Preview: IMU Alone - Watching It Drift Away

Part 1 of 4: Why Raw IMU Data Isn’t Enough for Robot Navigation
ros2
imu
perception
workshop
roscon-india
realsense
d435i
ROSCon India 2025 Workshop 4 by Yaanendriya Pvt. Ltd. features hands-on exercises in IMU-Centric Perception. This 4-part preview series takes you through the complete…
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 3 Preview: Advanced Networking (Exercises 6-8)

Part 3 of 3: Wireless Tuning, Congestion Handling, and NAT Traversal
ros2
zenoh
workshop
roscon-india
networking
performance
This is Part 3 (final) of the Workshop 3 exercise preview:
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 3 Preview: Remote Connectivity & Security (Exercises 4-5)

Part 2 of 3: Cloud Routers and mTLS for Secure Robot Communication
ros2
zenoh
workshop
roscon-india
security
networking
This is Part 2 of the Workshop 3 exercise preview:
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 3 Preview: Zenoh Fundamentals (Exercises 1-3)

Part 1 of 3: Core Pub/Sub, QoS, and Shared Memory Transport
ros2
zenoh
workshop
roscon-india
tutorial
ROSCon India 2025 Workshop 3 features 8 hands-on exercises exploring Zenoh middleware for ROS 2. This 3-part preview series helps you understand what you’ll learn:
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Workshop 3: Complete Exercises Walkthrough

Hands-on Zenoh Exercises Before ROSCon India 2025
ros2
zenoh
workshop
roscon-india
exercises
walkthrough
A comprehensive walkthrough of all 8 Zenoh workshop exercises with actual terminal output, preparing for the hands-on session
Dec 17, 2025
Rajesh

Preparing for Zenoh: Real-Time Web Dashboard for ROS2 Monitoring

Part 3 of 3: Building a 13-layer architecture from ROS2 callbacks to Canvas/SVG visualizations
ros2
zenoh
dashboard
visualization
flask
sse
Traditional ROS2 visualization tools like rviz2 and rqt require ROS2 installed on the viewing machine. For Workshop 3 at ROSCon India 2025, we needed:
Dec 15, 2025
Rajesh

Preparing for Zenoh: Performance Tuning Deep Dive

Part 2 of 3: Achieving 99.8% bandwidth reduction for WiFi-based robotics
ros2
zenoh
performance
networking
optimization
Our Unitree Go2 robot publishes approximately 50 MB/s of sensor data:
Dec 15, 2025
Rajesh

Preparing for Zenoh: Interactive Tools and Workshop Exercises

Part 1 of 3: Building the tooling infrastructure for ROSCon India 2025 Workshop 3
ros2
zenoh
docker
workshop
tools
Workshop 3 at ROSCon India 2025 focuses on Zenoh middleware bridging over WiFi. The real challenge? Our Unitree Go2 robot publishes approximately 50 MB/s of sensor data -…
Dec 15, 2025
Rajesh

Fixing Linux Laptop Suspend: A Delayed Shutdown Solution

Linux
Power Management
systemd
Tutorial
NVIDIA
When s2idle fails you, build a custom lid-close handler that waits before shutting down - with dynamic configuration
Dec 15, 2025
Rajesh

Building a Modern Offline ROS 2 Workshop Infrastructure: ROSCon India 2025

ROS2
Docker
Zenoh
Workshop
ROSCon
NVIDIA
Gazebo
How we built Docker infrastructure with modern Gazebo Sim, GPU acceleration, DDS↔︎Zenoh bridging, complete offline support, and handled last-minute deprecation challenges
Dec 15, 2025
Physical AI Lab Team

Setting Up Your Physical AI Laboratory

Infrastructure
Docker
Isaac Sim
Isaac Lab
Tutorial
A complete beginner’s guide to NVIDIA Isaac Sim & Isaac Lab on Ubuntu 24.04 with Docker
Dec 12, 2025
Rajesh
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