Home // International Journal On Advances in Intelligent Systems, volume 3, numbers 3 and 4, 2010 // View article
Authors:
Ray Jarvis
Keywords: Human/Machine Interaction, Teleoperation, Localisation, Cyberspace, Robot Navigation, Rough Terrain, Force Feedback.
Abstract:
This paper concerns the development of a force feedback enhanced teleoperation system for outdoor robotic vehicles navigating in rough terrain where true-colour 3D virtual world models of the working environment, created from laser and colour image scans collected offline, can be explored by walkthroughs both before and during the robot navigation mission itself. In other words, the physical mission intended can be partially rehearsed in cyberspace[1]. Further, during a mission, the location and orientation (localisation) of the vehicle are continually determined and global collision-free paths to selected goal locations made available as advice to the operator, who can follow or ignore such advice at will. Live (realtime) 3D laser range data also provides an up-to-date scan of the volume immediately surrounding the vehicle as it moves so that dynamic obstacles can be avoided. Local terrain-roughness is taken into account in the provision of local collision-free paths, the subgoals of which are operator determined. This live range data is matched with the pre-scanned range data to calculate the accurate robot vehicle localisation (position and orientation) which is provided continuously during the navigation mission. A force feedback 3D joystick reflects terrain roughness as a vibration in one axis and the other two axes are used to provide a 2D force to attract the operator towards following the local optimal collision-free path, but this attraction can be easily overridden by the operator. The instrumentation and methodologies used for localisation, path planning, force feedback teleoperation and 3D exploration are presented, together with some preliminary experimental results for large outdoor, natural environments.
Pages: 174 to 186
Copyright: Copyright (c) to authors, 2010. Used with permission.
Publication date: April 6, 2011
Published in: journal
ISSN: 1942-2679