Designing low cost autonomous robots in unknown environments
Ali T. Alouani, Aravind M. Sri · Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE · 2008
This paper documents the design and development of a low cost robot capable of autonomous navigation in unknown indoor environments. The proposed design uses only two complementary rotating sensors for navigation. The use of real time mapping allows for detection and avoidance of obstacles. The fusion of the sensors data helped improve accuracy of the online map of the robot environment. The robot builds an online map of its environment, and then automatically plans its navigation path. The feedback control keeps the robot moving along its planned path. The robot has been successfully tested in a cluttered environment in the Advanced Systems Lab. Preliminary tests carried out have shown the success of the robot in navigating autonomously.