UAVs Beneath the Surface: Cooperative Autonomy for Subterranean Search and Rescue in DARPA SubT

Kód výsledku v IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F68407700%3A21230%2F23%3A00363007" target="_blank" >RIV/68407700:21230/23:00363007 - isvavai.cz</a>

Výsledek na webu

<a href="https://doi.org/10.55417/fr.2023001" target="_blank" >https://doi.org/10.55417/fr.2023001</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.55417/fr.2023001" target="_blank" >10.55417/fr.2023001</a>

Jazyk výsledku

angličtina

Název v původním jazyce

UAVs Beneath the Surface: Cooperative Autonomy for Subterranean Search and Rescue in DARPA SubT

Popis výsledku v původním jazyce

This paper presents a novel approach for autonomous cooperating UAVs in search and rescue operations in subterranean domains with complex topology. The proposed system was ranked second in the Virtual Track of the DARPA SubT Finals as part of the team CTU-CRAS-NORLAB. In contrast to the winning solution that was developed specifically for the Virtual Track, the proposed solution also proved to be a robust system for deployment onboard physical UAVs flying in the extremely harsh and confined environment of the real-world competition. The proposed approach enables fully autonomous and decentralized deployment of a UAV team with seamless simulation-to-world transfer, and proves its advantage over less mobile UGV teams in the flyable space of diverse environments. The main contributions of the paper are present in the mapping and navigation pipelines. The mapping approach employs novel map representations — SphereMap for efficient risk-aware long-distance planning, FacetMap for surface coverage, and the compressed topological-volumetric LTVMap for allowing multi-robot cooperation under low-bandwidth communication. These representations are used in navigation together with novel methods for visibility-constrained informed search in a general 3D environment with no assumptions about the environment structure, while balancing deep exploration with sensor-coverage exploitation. The proposed solution also includes a visual-perception pipeline for on-board detection and localization of objects of interest in four RGB stream at 5 Hz each without a dedicated GPU. Apart from participation in the DARPA SubT, the performance of the UAV system is supported by extensive experimental verification in diverse environments with both qualitative and quantitative evaluation.

Název v anglickém jazyce

UAVs Beneath the Surface: Cooperative Autonomy for Subterranean Search and Rescue in DARPA SubT

Popis výsledku anglicky

This paper presents a novel approach for autonomous cooperating UAVs in search and rescue operations in subterranean domains with complex topology. The proposed system was ranked second in the Virtual Track of the DARPA SubT Finals as part of the team CTU-CRAS-NORLAB. In contrast to the winning solution that was developed specifically for the Virtual Track, the proposed solution also proved to be a robust system for deployment onboard physical UAVs flying in the extremely harsh and confined environment of the real-world competition. The proposed approach enables fully autonomous and decentralized deployment of a UAV team with seamless simulation-to-world transfer, and proves its advantage over less mobile UGV teams in the flyable space of diverse environments. The main contributions of the paper are present in the mapping and navigation pipelines. The mapping approach employs novel map representations — SphereMap for efficient risk-aware long-distance planning, FacetMap for surface coverage, and the compressed topological-volumetric LTVMap for allowing multi-robot cooperation under low-bandwidth communication. These representations are used in navigation together with novel methods for visibility-constrained informed search in a general 3D environment with no assumptions about the environment structure, while balancing deep exploration with sensor-coverage exploitation. The proposed solution also includes a visual-perception pipeline for on-board detection and localization of objects of interest in four RGB stream at 5 Hz each without a dedicated GPU. Apart from participation in the DARPA SubT, the performance of the UAV system is supported by extensive experimental verification in diverse environments with both qualitative and quantitative evaluation.

Druh

J_ost - Ostatní články v recenzovaných periodicích

CEP obor

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OECD FORD obor

20204 - Robotics and automatic control

Projekt

Výsledek vznikl pri realizaci vícero projektů. Více informací v záložce Projekty.

Návaznosti

P - Projekt vyzkumu a vyvoje financovany z verejnych zdroju (s odkazem do CEP)

Rok uplatnění

2023

Kód důvěrnosti údajů

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Název periodika

Field Robotics

ISSN

2771-3989

e-ISSN

2771-3989

Svazek periodika

3

Číslo periodika v rámci svazku

January

Stát vydavatele periodika

US - Spojené státy americké

Počet stran výsledku

68

Strana od-do

1-68

Kód UT WoS článku

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EID výsledku v databázi Scopus

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