Mobile Robots for Search and Rescue PeLoTe Session Niramon Ruangpayoongsak Institute of Automatic Control Engineering University of Siegen Siegen, Germany Email:niramon.r@uni-siegen.de Hubert Roth Applied Computer and Software Engineering Centre (ARS) Wuerzburg, Germany Email: hubert.roth@uni-siegen.de Jan Chudoba Gerstener Laboratory, Department of Cybernetics Czech Technical University Prague, Czech Republic Email:chudoba@labe.felk.cvut.cz Abstract – Mobile robots are integrated into a search and rescue team as tools for searching victims in dangerous areas that is harmful for human, as to provide the perception data for map building, and as to follow the human entity during the mission. The teleoperated control and the autonomous path following is implemented on the robots for the semi- autonomous navigation in the simulated firing scenario. This paper focuses on the robot entities in the PeLoTe project (Building Presence through Localization for Hybrid Telematic Teams). The architecture of the software integration for mobile robots into the PeLoTe system and the experimental results are presented. Index Terms – Mobile robot, Rescue team, Teleoperated control, Semi-autonomous navigation. I. INTRODUCTION In the search and rescue operation, mobile robots are presently developed in order to assist humans in dangerous and risky tasks during the mission. As a team, the corporation of human and robot can be managed by a remote coordinator, who is located in a safe remote place outside of the disaster area. This hybrid telematic team is presented in [1]. As a team member, the task of a mobile robot is to explore the unknown area and the dangerous area that is not accessible or risky for the human. By using the appropriate perception equipment, the mobile robot can localize itself and also senses the surrounding in the dark area, in which the human has low visibility. Meanwhile, the human entity equips the sensors, a data processing unit and a small display. He can also localize himself and sense the surrounding in the similar way as the robots. The mobile robots have two main functions during the mission; one is to provide the sensor data for the mapping module and another one is to follow the human entity. These robots are based on the same control concept using on the architecture of the microcontroller and the PC104. Nevertheless, the software interface protocols of these robots are not identical. Thus, the integration methodology of the robot software into the PeLoTe system is designed. This paper describes the tasks, features, functionalities, and the integration methodology of the mobile robots in the PeLoTe project (Building Presence through Localization for Hybrid Telematic Teams) funded by the European Community under the IST-program: Future and Emerging Technologies. The experiments were performed in the firing scenario and the experimental results are also presented. II. MOBILE ROBOTS The PeLoTe project targets on the concept of creating the presence feature via remote control and navigation, as well as knowledge sharing in combined communities of living and nonliving entities. The foreseen applications include next generation teleoperation and telediagnosis systems incorporating both humans and semi-autonomous robots, design of highly realistic man-machine interfaces, allowing accomplished complex teleoperation tasks. A. Robot tasks In the present time, most of the rescue teams only require teleoperated robots, exception are the military that claim autonomous robots for map building or exploration of environment. Fire fighters are in some cases cautious about the reliability and adaptability of autonomy, for these cases teleoperated robots are wanted. In any case, the robots need to provide autonomous low-level actions and emergency handling methods in order to meet the requirement of robustness. E.g. the robot finds the way back in case of communication interruption. These requirements will be addressed. Desired autonomies for robots in a farer future are: Provide data for map building Explore the environment Search for wounded people in wide areas Carry equipments In the opinion of the fire fighters, more autonomous robots might be used in the farer future in order to handle tasks on their own. Typical tasks, which are desirable to be executed autonomously are for examples, search for wounded people in wide areas and exploration of dangerous areas, provide the updated map according to detected dangerous areas from gas or fire or closed path of building from collapses, and also to carry heavy equipments for the firemen during the rescue mission. In addition, the robot might perform routine tasks for saving time for human. Telepresence techniques are thus necessary during the mission for mobile robots in receiving sensor data, video image and audio from the remote places. Under semi autonomous function, a fire fighter, who performs as an operator can command the robot to reach a position on the Proceedings of the 2005 IEEE International Workshop on Safety, Security and Rescue Robotics Kobe, Japan, June 2005 0-7803-8945-X/05/$20.00 ©2005 IEEE. 212