Navigation by Isolated Landmarks

In this paper we propose and demonstrate a simple method for navigation in a large unstructured environment that contains featureless objects, which uses \isolated" landmarks in the navigator's view. The map-maker and navigator are implemented using an IBM 7575 SCARA robot arm, the PIPE (Pipelined Image Processing Engine), and two cameras. The navigational environment consists of a at plane with spherical objects populated randomly on it. First, the map-maker model observes the environment, given a starting position and a goal position, and it generates a \custom map" that describes describes \how" to get from the starting position to the goal position. The accuracy and the eeciency of the directional instructions are then demonstrated by the navigator by following the commands in the \custom map". This is a rst step towards our eventual goal, which is to develop a full set of vocabulary that can qualitatively \describe" the navigational environment to direct the navigator with eeciency and accuracy.