MERLIN vehicles for outdoor applications
Klaus Schilling, Qinghao Meng · Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE · 2002
In the context of the European Mars Rover development, prototype vehicles for wheeled, tracked and tumbling locomotion have been implemented and tested. As a spin-off the versatile tracked and wheeled MERLIN (Mobile Experimental Rover for Locomotion and Intelligent Navigation) rovers for outdoor applications resulted. In this paper the navigation sensors and the control system are addressed, supporting the locomotion devices to deal with rough terrain, including autonomous obstacle detection and avoidance strategies. In addition an advanced telematics infrastructure for remote sensor data acquisition and tele-operations has been realized for these vehicles.