Locally-Referenced Ultrasonic – LPS for Localization and Navigation

Abstract

This paper presents a flexible deployment of ultrasonic position sensors and a novel positioning algorithm suitable for the navigation of mobile robots (MRs) in extensive indoor environments. Our proposal uses several independently-referenced local positioning systems (LPS), which means that each one of them operates within its own local reference system. In a typical layout, an indoor extensive area can be covered using just a reduced set of globally-referenced LPS (GRLPS), whose beacon positions are known to the global reference system, while the rest of the space can be covered using locally-referenced LPSs (LRLPS) that can be distributed arbitrarily. The number of LRLPS and their position can be also changed at any moment. The algorithm is composed of several Bayesian filters running in parallel, so that when an MR is under the GRLPS coverage area, its position is updated by a global filter, whereas when the MR is inside the LRLPS area, its position is updated using position increments within a local filter. The navigation algorithm has been tested by simulation and with actual data obtained using a real set of ultrasonic LPSs.

Performance of Location and Positioning Systems: a 3D-Ultrasonic System Case

“…The 2D LOCATE-US ULPS, designed by the GEINTRA-US/RF Research Group from the University of Alcala [4] [24], is a compact, light and portable ultrasonic beacon architecture [5]. The ULPS is formed of five coplanar ultrasonic beacons (B i , where i=1,2,…5), placed at the four corners of a 0.707m x 0.707m square and at the centre, as is shown in Fig.…”

“…As the emission pattern of transducers is 120º [5], the ULPS can cover an area of 40m² roughly for a height of 3.5m. Any receiver inside the coverage area (attached to smartphones, a mobile robot (MR), a drone, ...) can compute its position in an independent and autonomous way [4] [24]. In order to cover wide indoor areas, several ULPSs can be easily deployed.…”

“…This work has been initially based on the previous LOCATE-US LPS (ULPS), firstly developed by the GEINTRA-US/RF Research Group from the University of Alcalá for 2D positioning [4]. A performance analysis of an ULPS is presented here when it is adapted for 3D positioning in a certain region.…”

Development of a Web-Based Indoor Navigation System Using an Accelerometer and Gyroscope: A Case Study at The Faculty of Natural Sciences of Comenius University

“…Depending on many factors such as their degree of accuracy, response time or financial demands, various methods can be used to determine the actual location of a device. Until now, many technologies have been developed and used for detection of a device in interiors, e.g., multisensor-based navigation; Wireless Fidelity (Wi-Fi) triangulation (Ma et al, 2015;Shandilya and Idate, 2015); Radio Frequency IDentification (RFID) used in conjunction with Near Field Communication (NFC) (Geng et al, 2014); ultrasound (Gualda et al, 2014); inertial systems (Woodman, 2007); etc. These technologies have been described in detail in many studies (Dardari et al, 2015;Gu et al, 2009;Jeon et al, 2015;Koyuncu and Yang, 2010;Mautz, 2009;Mautz, 2012;Ozdenizci et al, 2015;Yasir et al, 2016).…”

A realistic evaluation of indoor positioning systems based on Wi-Fi fingerprinting: The 2015 EvAAL–ETRI competition

“…In fact, a spectacular growth of studies about indoor location has been witnessed since RADAR [3] was proposed in 2000. The ubiquity of Wi-Fi Internet connectivity and smartphones make Wi-Fi-based positioning very popular [3,41,17,22,60,47,49,11,39,42], despite the diversity of the technologies available for indoor positioning: Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) [33,51,9], Bluetooth [20,44], ZigBee [50], Ultrasound [30,26,55], Magnetic field variations [14,27], LED light [38,34], Ultra Wide Band [25,23], and Hybrid solutions [32], among others. The IPSs based on Wi-Fi fingerprinting techniques are preferred to those based on the propagation model, angle of arrival, time of arrival and time difference of arrival because they do not require any very specialized hardware, line-of-sight to the emitter, or knowledge about the precise location of radio emitters to operate [71,70].…”