Estimating location and avoiding collision against unknown obstacles for the mobile robot using omnidirectional image sensor COPIS

Abstract

Proposes a new omnidirectional image sensor, COPIS (conic projection image sensor), for guiding navigation of a mobile robot. It features passive sensing of omnidirectional images of the environment in real-time (at the frame rate of a TV camera) using a conic mirror. COPIS is a suitable sensor for visual navigation in real world environment with moving objects. The paper describes a method for estimating the location and the motion of the robot by detecting the azimuth of each object in the omnidirectional image. It also presents a method to avoid collision against unknown obstacles and estimates their locations by detecting their azimuth changes while the robot is moving in the environment.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">&gt;</ETX>