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Robot task execution when situated in real-world environments is fragile. As such, robot architectures must rely on robust error recovery, adding non-trivial complexity to highly-complex robot systems. To handle this complexity in development, we introduce Recovery-Driven Development (RDD), an iterative task scripting process that facilitates rapid task and recovery development by leveraging hierarchical specification, separation of nominal task and recovery development, and situated testing. We validate our approach with our challenge-winning mobile manipulator software architecture developed using RDD for the FetchIt! Challenge at the IEEE 2019 International Conference on Robotics and Automation. We attribute the success of our system to the level of robustness achieved using RDD, and conclude with lessons learned for developing such systems., Comment: Published and presented at International Symposium on Robotics Research (ISRR), 2019 in Hanoi, Vietnam

Background: We investigated whether the characteristics of Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients differ based on the primary indication for deep brain stimulation (DBS). Methods: We reviewed data for 149 consecutive PD patients who underwent DBS at the University of Virginia. Patients were categorized based on primary surgical indication, and clinical characteristics were compared between groups. Results: Twenty-nine (93.5%) of 31 PD patients who underwent DBS for medication refractory tremor were men, and 66 (62.3%) of 106 PD patients who underwent DBS for motor fluctuations were men (p = 0.001). Other primary indications for DBS were tremor and fluctuations (n = 5), medication intolerance (n = 5), and dystonia (n = 2). Discussion: Patients who underwent DBS for medication refractory tremor were predominantly men, while patients who had DBS for motor fluctuations approximated the gender distribution of PD. Possible explanations are that men with PD are more likely to develop medication refractory tremor or undergo surgery for medication refractory tremor in PD compared to women. Keywords: Deep brain stimulation, Parkinson's disease, gender, tremor, motor fluctuations Citation: Dalrymple WA, Pusso A, Sperling SA, Flanigan JL, Huss DS, Harrison MB, et al. Comparison of Parkinson’s disease patient characteristics by indication for deep brain stimulation: men are more likely to have DBS for tremor. Tremor Other Hyperkinet Mov. 2019; 9. doi: 10.7916/tohm.v0.676, Tremor and Other Hyperkinetic Movements, Tremor and Other Hyperkinetic Movements