This paper presents a method for cave surveying in total darkness using an autonomous aerial vehicle equipped with a depth camera for mapping, downward-facing camera for state estimation, and forward and downward lights. Traditional methods of cave surveying are labor-intensive and dangerous due to the risk of hypothermia when collecting data over extended periods of time in cold and damp environments, the risk of injury when operating in darkness in rocky or muddy environments, and the potential structural instability of the subterranean environment. Although these dangers can be mitigated by deploying robots to map dangerous passages and voids, real-time feedback is often needed to operate robots safely and efficiently. Few state-of-the-art, high-resolution perceptual modeling techniques attempt to reduce their high bandwidth requirements to work well with low bandwidth communication channels. To bridge this gap in the state of the art, this work compactly represents sensor observations as Gaussian mixture models and maintains a local occupancy grid map for a motion planner that greedily maximizes an information-theoretic objective function. The approach accommodates both limited field of view depth cameras and larger field of view LiDAR sensors and is extensively evaluated in long duration simulations on an embedded PC. An aerial system is leveraged to demonstrate the repeatability of the approach in a flight arena as well as the effects of communication dropouts. Finally, the system is deployed in Laurel Caverns, a commercially owned and operated cave in southwestern Pennsylvania, USA, and a wild cave in West Virginia, USA.
翻译:本文展示了一种在完全黑暗中进行洞穴测量的方法。 洞穴测量的传统方法是劳动密集和危险的,因为在寒冷和潮湿环境中长时间收集数据时可能会发生低温,在岩石或泥土环境中在黑暗中作业时有受伤的风险,以及地下环境潜在的结构性不稳定。虽然通过部署机器人绘制危险的通道和空隙地图可以减轻这些危险,但安全有效地操作机器人往往需要实时反馈。 很少有最先进的、高分辨率的视觉模型技术试图降低高频带宽要求,以便利用低频带宽通信渠道运作。为了缩小这种状态中的这种差距,这项工作将传感器观察作为高压或泥土环境中的混合物模型,并维持当地居住网图,以便绘制出危险的通道和空洞隙。 这种方法既能容纳有限的深度相机,又能安全高效地操作机器人。 很少有最先进的、高分辨率的、高分辨率的、高分辨率的、高分辨率的感知觉模型试图减少高频带的带宽度的带宽度测量技术。 在空中运行的轨道定位系统上,一个长期的、可移动的、可移动的、可移动的轨道感测距系统在空中进行。