Abstract
To increase the success rate of space exploration missions by rovers, usually several different types of sensors are mounted. This study, however, discusses the possibility and limitation of autonomous movement of a planetary exploration rover by using only a Laser-Range-Finder (LRF). Terrain recognition by only a LRF implies a possibility for a rover to keep moving, because a mounted computer can handle the LRF outputs in real time without any support from a ground station on Earth. In this paper, as a possibility of a scanning LRF to substitute for an image sensor, recognition of rover's slip and stuck from scanning LRF outputs is examined. As a preliminary study for an experiment using a real LRF, computer simulations are conducted by using virtual LRF outputs for a variety of terrains numerically generated with random numbers. To simply the problem, the LRF outputs are assumed to be obtained by a stationary rover in this paper. The results indicate that travel distance of a rover can be estimated with less than 13 % of error.
