Auto-creation and navigation of the multi-area topological map for 3D large-scale environment

Abstract

The widely used topological map is quite essential to localization and navigation for mobile robot, especially in large-scale environment. In this paper, a new structure of topological map is presented and applied in robot navigation. This kind of map, compared to occupancy grid map and conventional topological map, can better represent the environment with certain features, such as multi-floor and multi-type, and reduce time and space complexity to a degree. In this case, it will be more convenient for the creation and maintenance of topological map, and the navigation based on this kind of map become more efficient and robust. Finally, certain experiments demonstrate that this approach is very effective. © 2010 Springer-Verlag.