Integration of inertial information with vision towards robot autonomy

A computational approach for sensorial data integration, inertial and vision, is presented for a mobile robot equipped with an active vision system and inertial sensors. A brief description of low-cost inertial sensors and their integration in an inertial system prototype is described. The set of sensors used in the prototype include three piezoelectric vibrating gyroscopes, a tri-axial capacitive accelerometer and a dual axis clinometer. The clinometer is used to track camera's pan and tilt, relative to a plane normal to the gravity vector and parallel to the ground floor. An algorithm that segments the image, identifying the floor along which the vehicle can move is obtained.