Developing a service robot

A service robot designed to be of practical use in offices and commercial environments has been developed. Moving on wheels, with a pair of four-degrees-of-freedom (DOF) arms and grippers, and a pan-tilt mechanism carrying eight cameras, the robot is designed to operate efficiently in public spaces. The robot houses a CPU board, two DSP boards, a vision board, and local processors, which form an internal LAN and communicate with each other. This paper presents the hardware features of the robot, outlines its typical applications and introduces its 3D vision-based navigation system, which is central to the execution of its tasks.