Fuzzy logic controllers for Mobile robot navigation in unknown environment using Kinect sensor

3D vision is becoming more and more common in many applications such as localization, autonomous navigation, map construction, path following, inspection, monitoring or risky situation detection. Depth cameras are new sensing systems that capture RGB images along with per-pixel depth information. In this paper, how such cameras can be used in the context of robotics is investigated, specifically for navigation, recognition, and building dense 3D maps in indoor environments. Reactive navigation system for indoor environment using Kinect sensor is developed to allow the mobile robot to move to a goal or follow a moving target with obstacles avoiding. Fuzzy logic controllers were used for real time navigation. The proposed system also works in the dark, which is a great advantage for surveillance systems. Experiments were performed with the mobile robot Pioneer P3-AT equipped with a Kinect sensor in order to validate and evaluate the proposed navigation algorithm.