Autonomous Navigation System for the Indoor/Outdoor Environment

In this paper, we describe a versatile navigation system for autonomous mobile robot that we have developed. As a development background, there is an increasing demand for autonomous mobile robot to play an active part in the human living environment in recent years. That is indicated to need a more versatile to the navigation system. In here, the versatile system that it can be used for indoor or outdoor without limiting the operating environment. To realize this, we propose a navigation system using an electronic map which is easy to access. To perform the localization by comparing the information of shape about the surrounding environment acquired from LIDAR data with electronic map data around the robot's position. In order not to approach into a local hazardous area where are not registered on the electronic map, robots have to detect and avoid the area on the fly. To detect the hazardous area, traversability analysis should be performed in real-time with a 3D point cloud acquiring form the LiDAR data. The collision avoidance maneuver may be carried out by a real-time path planning based on the dynamics of the robot and the results of the traversability analysis. Several experiments along with the route which contains both indoor and outdoor environments in the distance of more than 1,300m travel are carried out to examine the system's versatility.