Robust autonomous navigation system based on compound eye systems of flying insects

2017 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 15K14254
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Aerospace engineering
• Research Institution: Kyushu University
• Principal Investigator: Hokamoto Shinji 九州大学, 工学研究院, 教授 (80199463)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): 坂東 麻衣 九州大学, 工学研究院, 准教授 (40512041)
• Project Period (FY): 2015-04-01 – 2018-03-31
• Keywords: 自律航法 / 運動推定 / オプティックフロー / 広域統合 / 距離推定

Outline of Final Research Achievements

This research aims to develop a feasible engineering system to robustly estimate a vehicle's motion variables for autonomous flight, based on Wide-Field-Integration (WFI) of optic flow. Because optic flow is obtained from image sensors with restricted field of views, the number and placement/optical axes of image sensors are the important factors for the accurate estimation. This research investigated the effect of them as well as the combination method of optic flow by using numerical simulations and experiments. A sensor board to experimentally obtain optic flow has been improved to realize a practical WFI of optic flow sensor. Furthermore, this research showed some guidelines to combine with other sensors and some distance estimation methods to obstacles for autonomous obstacle detection and avoidance.

Free Research Field

航空宇宙工学