Abstract
This paper proposes a new localization method based on the Particle Filter algorithm for intravehicular robots flying inside space vehicles, such as the International Space Station (ISS). Since safety requirements are strict in space vehicles, the development of an accurate and robust localization method is a significant issue. The robot must be capable of actively sensing the environment in order to localize itself, because in general there are no external devices such as beacons that provide positional information. Thus, we have assumed that the robot has only sonar sensors for estimating its position and attitude in three-dimensional space. We developed a simulation environment for evaluation of the proposed method. It should be noted that the proposed method can solve the so-called global localization problem in an environment including some unknown objects.
