Mobile Robotics Development and Validation Plarform Using Vortex

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Mobile robotic systems play an increasingly important role in many areas such as production systems, terrestrial and planetary exploration, and personal robotics. This project aims at the development of a mobile-robotics software platform with a particular focus on design for and operations on unstructured environments. A simulation environment that will be capable of online and off-line applications is planned. We will develop a comprehensive dynamics-modelling framework capable of addressing mobile robotics development tasks in both structured and unstructured environments. A key point will be the detailed characterization of vehicle/terrain interactions and their incorporation in the modelling environment. We will go further than a standard simulation environment normally does. Analysis tools and algorithms will also be established and implemented to validate and characterize operations and designs of mobile robots. The proposed research will produce methods to evaluate energy expenditure, mobility, and measures that characterize the performance of a mobile platform during operation. These will be implemented as embedded modules that can send signals to the user on the validity of manoeuvres and the satisfaction of performance specifications. We will also implement algorithms, e.g. for suspension reconfiguration planning, which will allow the user to perform a detailed evaluation and synthesis of mechanical designs for mobile platforms. An important issue we intend to address is the modelling and simulation of off-road operations of mobile robots related to in-situ resource utilization, such as excavation and drilling. We will investigate both detailed off-line models and simplified online representations.