Sonar Grid Map Based Localization for Autonomous Mobile Robots

A mobile robot must be able to build a reliable map of surroundings and estimate its position. We have developed a technique for a grid-based localization of a mobile robot with ultrasonic sensors using extended Kalman filter (EKF). For this, we used grids themselves as landmarks of the environment. The grid-based localization can minimize the use of computer resources for localization because this approach does not rely on exact geometric representation of a landmark. Experiments were performed in a real environment to verify the methodology developed in this study, and the results indicate that the grid-based localization can be useful for a practical application.