Mobile robot locates source using partial rotation scans
Partial-Scan-and-Move Source Seeking for Mobile Robots
Robotics
Summary
Finding the exact location of a source like a signal or smell can be tricky for robots, especially if they have to spin all the way around to scan the environment before moving. This paper shows a way for robots to make decisions after scanning only part of a circle, rather than a full rotation. The authors created a method that lets the robot estimate the source direction while accounting for measurement noise. This approach helps the robot move efficiently and reliably closer to the source.
What this means in practice
- •For robotics engineers: Improve source-seeking robot navigation by allowing faster directional decisions using partial sensor scans instead of full rotations.
- •For environmental monitoring teams: Deploy mobile robots that can quickly locate pollutant or hazard sources by sampling partial environmental data at each position.
Authors
Bo Wang, Ishvar Sitaldin
Abstract
This paper presents a partial-scan-and-move strategy for source seeking with a mobile robot equipped with an offset scalar sensor. At each robot position, the sensor collects source field measurements while the robot rotates. Instead of requiring a complete circular scan before every move, we ask when the measurements collected over only part of the circle are already sufficient to determine the next action. We develop a gradient estimation method for partial scans together with a confidence set that accounts for measurement noise and local field variation. The robot uses this confidence set to decide whether it is close enough to the source or has enough information to move in a descent direction. We show that, under suitable conditions, each decision can be made within a prescribed partial scan and that the robot reaches a desired neighborhood of the source in finitely many moves with high probability.