Enhancement of Scan Matching Using an Environmental Magnetic Field

Abstract

Scan matching is one of the most reliable localization methods for mobile robots in known environments. However, an unexpected shift in posture remains its major issue. A method that uses an environmental magnetic field, a magnetic field that occurs in the environment, is presented to address this issue. The environmental magnetic field, which mostly refers to the geomagnetic field, is rarely changed by time. This unique property provides a means to enhance scan matching to provide a more robust localization method by using it to compensate the mobile robot’s pose. In this study, we describe how to compensate the mobile robot’s pose with the environmental magnetic field. Through experiments, we show that a mobile robot with the proposed method can recover, even if irregular changes in posture occur during the navigation.