Scan matching by cross-correlation and differential evolution

Scan matching is an important task, solved in the context of many high-level problems including pose estimation, indoor localization, simultaneous localization and mapping and others. Methods that are accurate and adaptive and at the same time computationally efficient are required to enable location-based services in autonomous mobile devices. Such devices usually have a wide range of high-resolution sensors but only a limited processing power and constrained energy supply. This work introduces a novel high-level scan matching strategy that uses a combination of two advanced algorithms recently used in this field: cross-correlation and differential evolution. The cross-correlation between two laser range scans is used as an efficient measure of scan alignment and the differential evolution algorithm is used to search for the parameters of a transformation that aligns the scans. The proposed method was experimentally validated and showed good ability to match laser range scans taken shortly after each other and an excellent ability to match laser range scans taken with longer time intervals between them.Web of Science88art. no. 85

Active SLAM for autonomous underwater exploration

Exploration of a complex underwater environment without an a priori map is beyond the state of the art for autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). Despite several efforts regarding simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) and view planning, there is no exploration framework, tailored to underwater vehicles, that faces exploration combining mapping, active localization, and view planning in a unified way. We propose an exploration framework, based on an active SLAM strategy, that combines three main elements: a view planner, an iterative closest point algorithm (ICP)-based pose-graph SLAM algorithm, and an action selection mechanism that makes use of the joint map and state entropy reduction. To demonstrate the benefits of the active SLAM strategy, several tests were conducted with the Girona 500 AUV, both in simulation and in the real world. The article shows how the proposed framework makes it possible to plan exploratory trajectories that keep the vehicle’s uncertainty bounded; thus, creating more consistent maps.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Spatio-temporal map maintenance for extending autonomy in long-term mobile robotic tasks

Working in hazardous environments requires routine inspections in order to meet safety standards. Dangerous quantities of nuclear contamination can exist in infinitesimally small volumes. In order to confidently inspect a nuclear environment for radioactive sources, especially those which emit alpha radiation, technicians must carefully maintain detectors at a consistent velocity and distance from a source. Technicians must also take careful records of which areas have been surveyed or not are important so that no area is left unmonitored. This is a difficult, exhausting task when the coverage area is larger than an office space. An autonomous mobile robotic platform with Complete Coverage Path Planning (CCPP) can reduce dangerous exposure to humans and provide better information for Radiological Control Technicians (RCT). The developed robotic system - or RCTbot - is designed for long-term deployment with little human correction, intervention, or maintenance required. To do this, the RCTbot creates a map of the environment, continually updates it based on multiple sensor inputs, and searches its map for contamination. In nuclear environments, the areas of interest often remain spatially constant throughout the duration of an inspection and are considered temporally static. The RCTbot monitors temporally static environments but adapts to dynamic changes over time. It then uses its sensor data to update and maintain its map so no manual human intervention is necessary. The spatio-temporal map maintenance (STMM) is agnostic to the survey type, so the RCTbot system is viable for application domain other than nuclear.Mechanical Engineerin

Autonomous 3D Exploration of Large Structures Using an UAV Equipped with a 2D LIDAR

This paper addressed the challenge of exploring large, unknown, and unstructured industrial environments with an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The resulting system combined well-known components and techniques with a new manoeuvre to use a low-cost 2D laser to measure a 3D structure. Our approach combined frontier-based exploration, the Lazy Theta* path planner, and a flyby sampling manoeuvre to create a 3D map of large scenarios. One of the novelties of our system is that all the algorithms relied on the multi-resolution of the octomap for the world representation. We used a Hardware-in-the-Loop (HitL) simulation environment to collect accurate measurements of the capability of the open-source system to run online and on-board the UAV in real-time. Our approach is compared to different reference heuristics under this simulation environment showing better performance in regards to the amount of explored space. With the proposed approach, the UAV is able to explore 93% of the search space under 30 min, generating a path without repetition that adjusts to the occupied space covering indoor locations, irregular structures, and suspended obstaclesUnión Europea Marie Sklodowska-Curie 64215Unión Europea MULTIDRONE (H2020-ICT-731667)Uniión Europea HYFLIERS (H2020-ICT-779411