NASA/UAH autonomous beacon navaigation and obstacle avoidance robot using Paral
NASA Robotics Team
Posts: 24
Hello Parallax forum readers:
We are one of the NASA Robotics Academy teams from the Marshall Space Flight Center. Our project is called "Return To The Moon" and we will be working on this project for the next 9 weeks and our goals are quite ambitious. This project is a joint cooperation between both NASA and the University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH).
Our project consists of designing and building a prototype autonomous robot. The robot should have the ability to:
- navigate using beacons in known locations
- travel to a specific location in a field
- avoid known obstacles and hazards
- avoid unknown obstacles and hazards
For our project we are going to be using a Parallax QuadRover and adding the capabilities needed to achieve our goals. We are still in the design phase, but some of the systems we are looking to use are Time Domain Ultra-Wide Band (UWB) Radio Transceivers for the beacons, a SICK LIDAR for obstacle detection, and the Propeller chip for navigation and controls. We are extremely excited about the project and the challenges that lie ahead of us.
We will try to update the forum thread every Thursday and give you guys an idea on the progress that the project is making. We will post documents, pictures, and links to videos during to the course of the building and programming so keep checking back with us.
Thanks guys,
NASA Robotics Team
Link to our project info:
http://education.nasa.gov/edprograms/descriptions/Marshall_Robotics_Academy.html
http://www.nasa.gov/
http://www.uah.edu/
We are one of the NASA Robotics Academy teams from the Marshall Space Flight Center. Our project is called "Return To The Moon" and we will be working on this project for the next 9 weeks and our goals are quite ambitious. This project is a joint cooperation between both NASA and the University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH).
Our project consists of designing and building a prototype autonomous robot. The robot should have the ability to:
- navigate using beacons in known locations
- travel to a specific location in a field
- avoid known obstacles and hazards
- avoid unknown obstacles and hazards
For our project we are going to be using a Parallax QuadRover and adding the capabilities needed to achieve our goals. We are still in the design phase, but some of the systems we are looking to use are Time Domain Ultra-Wide Band (UWB) Radio Transceivers for the beacons, a SICK LIDAR for obstacle detection, and the Propeller chip for navigation and controls. We are extremely excited about the project and the challenges that lie ahead of us.
We will try to update the forum thread every Thursday and give you guys an idea on the progress that the project is making. We will post documents, pictures, and links to videos during to the course of the building and programming so keep checking back with us.
Thanks guys,
NASA Robotics Team
Link to our project info:
http://education.nasa.gov/edprograms/descriptions/Marshall_Robotics_Academy.html
http://www.nasa.gov/
http://www.uah.edu/
Comments
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·"If you build it, they will come."
Sorry we missed the update last week, but here's the progress up until this point.
- Last week we gave a Feasibility Presentation on using beacon navigation on the moon. We went through the beacon types, how to compute a position solution, and types of sensors that can be used for navigation and obstacle avoidance.
- We're building a power supply and battery charger unit to power the LADAR and radio beacon receiver.
- We received the RC controller for the QuadRover, but we're awaiting the software to program the Propeller. We used the controller for some basic testing and verifying the system operation.
- We wrote basic movement code (forward, reverse, left, right, throttle, etc) and tested all of the possible movements to see how the Rover reacts and operates.
- We purchased a PropNIC (ucontroller.com) and interfaced it to a Propeller. We're able to ping the device, but I have yet to see TCP or UDP traffic even though data is traveling through the hub (We etherealed to data). We need UDP working to get data from the radio beacons.
- We got better documentation on the LADAR and are sending/receiving data from the Propeller. Still have formatting/decoding problems, but they are being worked on.
Next week
- Get the UDP data from the Time Domain radios on the Propeller.
- Begin coding the Fuzzy Logic navigation algorithms.
- Complete the systems power supply
- Complete brackets and mounts for the devices.
- Get the RC controls working so we can do terrain testing.
Thanks guys,
NASA Robotics Team
In the links that Josh provided, you can see that NASA sponsors interns
for their Robotics Academy. There are teams at Marshall Space Flight
Center in Huntsville, AL; Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD;
Ames Research Center, in Moffett Field, CA. This year there are three,
four member teams at MSFC. One of the teams is working on their project
as part of a class at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, Department of
Electrical and Computer Engineering under the mentor, Dr. Yuri Shtessel,
and the instructor, myself.
The first order of business was to get a decent robot. No small challenge.
Fortunately for us, Parallax gave us a generous educational discount on the
QuadRover (and through in extra sensors and Propeller processors). I can't
think of a better robot for this project and outdoor experiments in general.
THANKS PARALLAX.
The challenge that NASA proposed was a beacon navigation system. For
reasons of practicality in an outdoor environment, radio beacons were chosen.
We are fortunate that Huntsville, AL is home to Time Domain, a company that
makes an ultra wide band radio that, among other things, can be used for
localization. Time Domain has generously loaned several of their radios for the
summer project. These will allow, under current radio configuration, distance location
with 1 foot accuracy over 100 meters at a 8 Hz update rate.
The project has several intermediate goals:
1. R/C control will be used to test navigability over different terrain,
and latter as an emergency cutoff device.
2. Autonomous navigation from point-to-point using radio beacons for localization.
3. Autonomous navigation to a goal position avoiding mapped hazardous areas.
4. Autonomous navigation to a goal position avoiding mapped hazards and unmapped obstacles.
5. (optional) Dead reckoning, upon beacon loss, to a safe position or to an area covered
by other beacons.
Furthermore, the team will be using a fuzzy control algorithm proposed by staff at JPL
for lunar and planetary navigation.
Now I'll get out of the way and let the team do their magic.
John Piccirillo
Thanks guys,
Robotics Team
As a kid I was always amazed at the displays in the "space center" in Huntsville.
Last time I drove by I saw a Space Shuttle there ... pretty inspiring stuff.
Thanks for sharing.
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I am not sure if you guys are familiar with LADAR. If not, please read the following sentences:
LADAR - Laser line scanner returns distances up to every half degree over
a 180 degree sweep approximately every 80 milliseconds. This will be used
for obstacle detection. Industrial strength construction, weighs about 8 lbs.
Thanks Guys,
NASA Robotics Academy
Post Edited (NASA Robotics Team) : 7/1/2008 4:59:36 AM GMT
Radio - This is a ultra wide band radio transmitting at 4.7 GHz with
a bandwidth of
3.2 GHz. Four of these radios will be located in a field and one on
the rover.
The system will provide a robot position over a 200 x 200 meter field
with 1 foot
accuracy. Unit is about 4 x 6 x 2 inches.
If you guys have any questions about these pictures, please feel free to ask us.
Thanks guys,
NASA Robotics Academy
Post Edited (NASA Robotics Team) : 7/1/2008 5:01:21 AM GMT
Thanks guys,
NASA Robotics Team
Perhpas your control system would be adapted to a functional moon rover.
Any chance that a Propeller processor would go with?
The pics look great. You have a fine looking team.
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we had our design review presentation on last thursday and we are also uploading our presentation slides..feel free to ask questions.
Thanks,
Robotics Academy
Post Edited (NASA Robotics Team) : 7/9/2008 12:34:32 AM GMT
Any details you can offer would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
Greg
The Time Domain radios use the Ultra Wideband frequency to communicate with each other. Ranging and positioning is done only using the radios. You can setup a network of known radio beacons positions and you can range a mobile node (or multiple mobile nodes) to get their positioning data. They have a test program that shows the nodes and there positions on a 2D coordinate system. I also believe the radios are capable of 3D positioning, but for our application we didn't really need that capability. Interfacing to the devices are quite easy. They use UDP packets. Once you send a "connect message", the radio just keeps sending packets everytime any node on the network either send user data or new position data. I can get you the contact info of the Time Domain person helping us with the radios if you would like. He would be better able to answer some of your specific questions.
www.youtube.com/user/NASAROBOTICS
Greg
This model is subjected to changes
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http://www.youtube.com/user/NASAROBOTICS
The robot is not able to turn since we have not finished writing the algorithm to do this. This one was just an initial test
we will post some videos of this test on youtube
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http://www.youtube.com/user/NASAROBOTICS
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http://www.youtube.com/user/NASAROBOTICS
In reference to the GPS. Our project was dealing with the feasibility of using lunar beacon based navigation as an interim solution to GPS on the moon. We can use GPS (and the QuadRover has a GPS attachment), but there won't be satellites around the moon for a while (too costly and could not be utilized by enough people yet), so this system would be an interim solution.
We essentially had 8 weeks to get the robot navigating and we are able to navigate to a waypoint and obstacle detect. We're do some lab simulation on obstacle avoidance and it's working properly, this coming week is our last week and we're going to take the robot outside to test those features.
Our signature has a link to our Youtube page if you would like to see some of the videos.
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http://www.youtube.com/user/NASAROBOTICS
update some of the work they accomplished.
1. The QuadRover autonomously navigated to three, pre-determined
waypoints spread over a 30 m x 30 m field. The rover was started
in various positions and orientations. Four radio beacons were placed
at the field corners. The rover was not constrained to start within the
30 m x 30 m perimeter. This worked quite will and videos will be posted
shortly.
2. The on-board ladar was used to avoid unknown obstacles. On approaching
an obstacle the rover would turn to the side and continue moving. If the
obstacle was inside a pre-set distance, the rover stopped. The avoidance
was inverted so that the rover would "follow-the-leader". Videos of both of
these modes will be posted.
The plan is to continue adding sensors and capabilities to the rover in the coming
Fall semester. Some goals:
1. Interface a PC (probably running Linux) with the Propeller. Right now we are
using all eight cogs and the memory is about 80% full (this includes a chunk of
fuzzy control logic that was written, compiled, and simulated but not tested on
the rover).
2. Install wheel encoders and a rate gyro for dead-reckoning, i.e. a crude IMU.
3. Navigate under fuzzy control software to integrate going to a goal while avoiding
known (mapped) hazard areas and unknown obstacles.
We'll keep you posted.
Attached is the team Final Presentation.
John Piccirillo, Ph.D.
University of Alabama in Huntsville
Post Edited (JohnP) : 8/13/2008 4:58:01 PM GMT
posted to
www.youtube.com/NASArobotics
on August 8th.
Enjoy.
John Piccirillo
continuing to develop the QuadRover as a lunar and planetary rover.
They will use the radio navigation system and laser object detection
system began by the NASA summer robotics team and add capability
to the navigation algorithm. Since this is a new team, they will be
introducing themselves in a separate thread soon.
John-
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over where the summer NASA Robotics interns left off. We will continue
news and discussion about the follow-on effort on a new thread entitled
"UAHuntsville Team Luna".
John Piccirillo