Autonomous Navigation Robot
Indoor localization and mapping, the power to seek out a path in an unfamiliar building, or to find a specific place inside a large place like Hospitals, Universities, Shopping malls. Indoor localization and mapping are one amongst the foremost well-known applications of indoor positioning technolog
2025-06-28 16:30:32 - Adil Khan
Autonomous Navigation Robot
Project Area of Specialization RoboticsProject SummaryIndoor localization and mapping, the power to seek out a path in an unfamiliar building, or to find a specific place inside a large place like Hospitals, Universities, Shopping malls. Indoor localization and mapping are one amongst the foremost well-known applications of indoor positioning technology. The indoor location-based services have become engaging with the quick improvement of indoor position estimation. GPS is the most common technique to find paths but it does not work inside the buildings because GPS signals are weak after passing through heavy concrete structures. The main objective of this project is to help people to find their paths, their destination inside a building. It can be airport, shopping malls, hospitals, university but our main focus is university campus. This project aims is to do localization and mapping of specific building inside the campus and after that we embed this mapping inside a robot which helps the people to find their ways and it’ll make sure this by going with that person to his/her destination and after that the robot will come to its original position to serve the others. The complete project is divided into two major portions, the first is to do localization and mapping and second is to make robot efficient after embedding the map in robot. The user will be provided with some screen, placed on the robot so that user can tell their paths to robot, after that robot will respond to that person.
This project is dedicated towards the designing and developing of an indoor navigation system and embed it in autonomous mobile robot which have some display to ask the people to enter the location where he/she want to go and robot will leave the person to his/her destination and come back to its original place. To navigate in an unknown environment, while avoiding collisions is very important for any autonomous mobile device. Determine its own location and then plan the shortest path towards destination is called robot navigation. In order to navigate in an unknown environment, the robot requires the map of that environment. For Localization and mapping purpose SLAM (Simultaneous Localization and Mapping) technique is used. The process of SLAM uses a complex array of computations, algorithms and sensory inputs to navigate around a previously unknown environment. The robot which we are using have an exceptional odometry performance. Odometry is the measure of how well the robot can estimate its own position. This is normally calculated by the robot using the position of its wheels.
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Project Objectives- Obtain a specific suitable technique that will allow the navigation system to work in provided environment. There are so many techniques which can be used for navigation purposes but we have to pick that one which can work properly with our project and can fulfil our requirements.
- Determine the live position of the Robot known as localization and after serving the user it returns back to its original position. Determine the live position position of robot is depends upon the technique which we will use for navigation.
- To provide the user, an optimum path to reach the destination through navigation. While building the map of some environment the robot will have a number of paths to reach some destination but We have to find the shortest path to reach the destination.
- Human machine interaction so that the user can ask the robot for its destination. We have to make the robot efficient and user friendly so that the user has not face any difficulty while putting their destination on display screen.
The main objective of our project is indoor localization and mapping. LIDAR is Light Detection and Ranging uses Light in the form of a pulsed laser to detect the obstacle with its ranges and by having continuous obtaining of ranges throughout the environment with precise angle difference between every ranges it is possible to map the whole environment which is known as Laser scans, which includes Ranges, Angles, Cartesian coordinates and Number of the value obtained. We used every basic model of hardware like Raspberry Pi as the core of ROS and using RP lidar A1 model which also a 360-degree functional lidar.
We will control of our robot with ROS. ROS is the Robot Operating System, which is the group of software libraries used for building the Robotic applications which also has some algorithms with some development tools. Initially, ROS is connected with the Raspberry Pi. LiDAR sensor is used to build the map of surrounding and once it is made, we will go for destination marking. First Mapping is Done by controlling the robot manually from the ROS. After fixing the Destination point, path planning Algorithm should be performed, for Path Planning. It will plot the possible way to reach the destination, using the number of nodes and its distance between each node. After Path planning is done, Path following is done by making the Robot to follow the desired path using the coordinates while avoiding the obstacles. Every Movement is controlled by the ROS installed on Raspberry Pi by sending commands to the robot. At the same time localization is also done to visualize the current position of the robot. It Automatically follows the path and reaches the destination. The map which made by the LiDAR will be displayed on some display LCD and will be integrated with the robot so that the user can enter the destination on the display where he or her want to go and the robot can act accordingly.
Benefits of the ProjectAn idea of a project is arrived when a person seeks a solution of the problem. That problem generates multiple ideas to overcome that problem. Hence the project that is implemented further open doors to more industries and opportunities in the region, or sometimes internationally. Once the project is successful, it is a head start to more beneficial routes for the investors as well as the consumers.
In the world we are living the most precious thing one can consider is “time”. Time is the only entity which cannot be brought back in the life once it is gone. Therefore, the project we are developing, it is specially designed to save that precious entity, time, which is considered more dominant over money. Let’s see this through a real-life example. Suppose you are travelling to a foreign country or you have a connecting flight from a country where English is not so popular or they prefer to use the regional languages more. Then what would you do to navigate your gate number or zone number? You would roam around the premises but you cannot find your destination. Then you would go to a security personnel or airport staff to let them know about your problem and then you get to know that they don’t speak English. Here comes our project which will come into your life as a great help. You won’t be needing a person to ask for help instead you will consult a robot which has a LCD on it. You will just write your ticket number on that LCD and the robot will take you to your desired location. It saves all the hassle to look around and wasting the time. Now this idea can be implemented into shopping malls, for example you need to find the NIKE store, you can do it with some series of clicks on the robot and the robot will navigate your path. Locating an item in a grocery store through this project can also be done. This concept can be applied on the trollies and the trollies will take you to the item you wish to buy. This project can also be applied on the wheel chairs for the ease of disables. The maps of the residential places can be stored on the minicomputer which in our case is raspberry pi, through this the wheel chair can navigate the kitchen or the bedroom while doing the obstacle avoidance.
Once the project is functional then it will lead to an industry creating jobs and business opportunities and productivity for the new generations contributing in the GDP of Pakistan.
Technical Details of Final DeliverableThe technicalities of this project start off with the mini-computer which is Raspberry Pi in our project. It acts as the main medium which controls the robot taking inputs, giving outputs to the wheels to move in the particular directions. The main coding is done on Raspberry Pi using ROS, Robot Operating System. The Lidar sensor is used to develop the maps which are then saved in the Raspberry Pi which will be used for the navigation purposes. The Lidar sensor has a range of 12 meters hence we have to take our robot to every inch of the premises so that we can develop our maps and then use it. This is how we are making our robot intelligent.
S.L.A.M (simultaneous localization and mapping) algorithm technique is used which is a built-in library in the Lidar sensor which takes the laser points and convert it into an actual map.
Once the maps are developed with the help of Lidar sensor and S.L.A.M, now we have to plan our route. This is where the code works which is done in ROS (Robot operating system) in the Raspberry Pi. A code is written in such a way that if a person wants to go to a certain location, there will be multiple paths to reach there. Now it’s the job of our efficiently made code to select the shortest and the most suitable path to reach at that location.
The robot is moving in a dynamic environment hence there will be humans which will be moving around in the premises too. This is why we are doing dynamic obstacle avoidance in our code too. In order to detect an obstacle, we are using Ultra Sonic Sensors which can sense an object in front of it. The data of the Ultra Sonic sensors will be transferred to the Raspberry Pi in the ROS where the code processes it. Therefore, the robot will move away from its path, avoid the obstacle by moving aside and come back to its original path after avoiding the obstacle.
At the end the robot has an LCD display on it where the user will enter his desired location to give the input to the robot. The LCD will have the locations of every place, for example of every store in the mall. The user has to select a location from it and the robot will lead the user to his destination.
Final Deliverable of the Project HW/SW integrated systemCore Industry ITOther Industries Others Core Technology RoboticsOther Technologies OthersSustainable Development Goals Good Health and Well-Being for People, Gender Equality, Decent Work and Economic Growth, Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure, Reduced Inequality, Partnerships to achieve the GoalRequired Resources| Item Name | Type | No. of Units | Per Unit Cost (in Rs) | Total (in Rs) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total in (Rs) | 67400 | |||
| RP LiDAR | Equipment | 1 | 32000 | 32000 |
| Raspberry pi 4 model b | Equipment | 1 | 13000 | 13000 |
| Robot chassis with wheel encoders | Equipment | 1 | 5000 | 5000 |
| Stationary, printing, overheads | Miscellaneous | 1 | 1500 | 1500 |
| memory card 32 GB | Equipment | 1 | 900 | 900 |
| LCD | Equipment | 1 | 5000 | 5000 |
| Batteries | Equipment | 02 | 2500 | 5000 |
| Power Bank | Equipment | 1 | 5000 | 5000 |