An embedded robotic wheelchair control architecture with reactive navigations
Journal
IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering
Pages
810-815
Date Issued
2011
Author(s)
Abstract
In this paper, we propose a robotic wheelchair control architecture for reactive navigations to improve safety. The proposed solution is developed based on the XScale embedded platform and real-time embedded Linux. A touch panel is used to display useful information for users. In addition, reactive navigation techniques of mobile robots are developed by combining the obstacle detection sensor information to perform collision free navigations where the obstacle detection sensor uses a laser range finder and the reactive navigation uses the artificial field potential (APF) approach. The collections of obstacle information and realizations of APF navigations are implemented as device drivers in the kernel space to improve real time performance, as well as to reduce the computational loads of graphical user interface (GUI) in the user space. In addition, the modules of power monitoring, travel distance counter and drive speed counting are also developed as device drivers. Consequently, the proposed robotic wheelchair control architecture has the features of real-time performance, simple architecture, high reliability, and safety. Meanwhile, the device drivers and GUI are all developed as open source codes, and they are easy for integrations. Finally, a robotic wheelchair prototype is produced in our laboratory for experimental validations of the embedded robotic wheelchair control architecture, as well as for the evaluations of reactive navigations. ? 2011 IEEE.
Subjects
Artificial field
Computational loads
Device Driver
Embedded control systems
Embedded Linux
Embedded platforms
Embedded robotics
Experimental validations
High reliability
Kernel space
Laser range finders
Obstacle detection sensors
Open-source code
Power monitoring
Reactive navigation
Real time performance
Robotic wheelchairs
Touch panels
Travel distance
User spaces
Architecture
Computer operating systems
Embedded systems
Graphical user interfaces
Obstacle detectors
Real time systems
Robots
Safety engineering
Sensors
Wheelchairs
Robotics
SDGs
Type
conference paper