Surveys the developments of the last 20 years in the area of vision for mobile robot navigation. Two major components of the paper deal with indoor navigation and outdoor navigation. For each component, we have further subdivided our treatment of the subject on the basis of structured and unstructured environments. For indoor robots in structured environments, we have dealt separately with the cases of geometrical and topological models of space. For unstructured environments, we have discussed the cases of navigation using optical flows, using methods from the appearance-based paradigm, and by recognition of specific objects in the environment.

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Vision for mobile robot navigation: a survey

The issues involved in integrating multiple sensors into the operation of a system are presented in the context of the type of information these sensors can uniquely provide. A survey is provided of the variety of approaches to the problem of multisensor integration and fusion that have appeared in the literature in recent years ranging from general paradigms, frameworks, and methods for integrating and fusing multisensory information to existing multisensor systems used in different areas of application. General multisensor fusion methods, sensor selection strategies, and world models are examined, along with approaches to the integration and fusion of information from combinations of different types of sensors. Short descriptions of the role of multisensor integration and fusion in the operation of a number of existing mobile robots are provided, together with proposed high-level multisensory representations suitable for mobile robot navigation and control. Existing multisensor systems for industrial and other applications are considered. >

Multisensor integration and fusion in intelligent systems

An architecture is presented in which distributed task-achieving modules, or behaviours, cooperatively determine a mobile robot's path by voting for each of various possible actions. An arbiter then performs command fusion and selects that action which best satisfies the prioritized goals of the system, as expressed by these votes, without the need to average commands. Command fusion allows multiple goals and constraints to be considered simultaneously. Examples of implemented systems are given, and future research directions in command fusion are discussed.

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DAMN: a distributed architecture for mobile navigation

Systems and methods allow for the accurate determination of the terrestrial position of an autonomous vehicle in real time. A first position estimate of the vehicle 102 is derived from satellites of a global positioning system and/or a pseudolite(s). The pseudolite(s) may be used exclusively when the satellites are not in the view of the vehicle. A second position estimate is derived from an inertial reference unit and/or a vehicle odometer. The first and second position estimates are combined and filtered using novel techniques to derive a more accurate third position estimate of the vehicle's position. Accordingly, accurate autonomous navigation of the vehicle can be effectuated using the third position estimate.

Vehicle position determination system and method

Systems and methods for positioning and navigating an autonomous vehicle (102,310) allow the vehicle (102,310) to travel between locations. A first position estimate (112) of the vehicle (102,310) is derived from satellites (132-170,200-206) of a global positioning system (100A) and/or a pseudolite(s) (105). The pseudolite(s) (105) may be used exclusively when the satellites (132-170,200-206) are not in view of the vehicle (102,310). A second position estimate (114) is derived from an inertial reference unit (904) and/or a vehicle odometer (902). The first and second position estimates are combined and filtered to derive a third position estimate (118). Navigation of the vehicle (102,310) is obtained using the position information (414), obstacle detection and avoidance data (416), and on board vehicle data (908,910).

Integrated vehicle positioning and navigation system, apparatus and method

A description is given of the first cross-country map and sensor-based autonomous operation of a robotic vehicle. Experiments on the autonomous land vehicle (ALV) in natural terrain were performed. An overview of the software architecture is provided, and details of the perception and planning techniques are presented. Two key experiments in which the vehicle avoided known and unknown obstacles in its path are described. >

D. Olin

Papers

Autonomous cross-country navigation with the ALV