ODS-Bot: Mobile Robot Navigation for Outdoor Delivery Services

Abstract

Autonomous mobile robots have been used in outdoor delivery services. Delivery robots have to cope with dynamic obstacles and various environmental conditions. Although several successful technological solutions are available for indoor applications, there are still plenty of unsolved problems in outdoor environments. In this study, we concentrate on three technological challenges hindering the development of campus delivery robots. The first challenge is robust localization in various dynamic outdoor environments. Localization results obtained using lidars and Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) sensors show complementary advantages and disadvantages. The proposed localization strategy efficiently combines information from multiple sensors. The second challenge is safe navigation based on the detection of the traversable region. The presented terrain traversability analysis provides clear, real-time positive and negative obstacle information. The third challenge is the requirement of an effective path planning strategy to reduce the risk of collisions or deadlocks. We collected the appearance history of regional dynamic obstacles in the map. The resultant path was carefully generated to avoid crowded areas. Experimental verifications have been successfully conducted on the Korea University campus. The presented results clearly indicate that the proposed methods are essential to achieve safe and reliable navigation in dynamic, real-world environments.