Localization and mapping for aerial manipulation based on range-only measurements and visual markers

This paper presents a new approach for aerial robots simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) oriented to aerial manipulation applications. The approach is based on the integration of range-only measurements and visual markers detected with the on-board camera. A multiple hypotheses framework is applied for range-only together with visual markers SLAM. This approach allows integrating two different types of sensors that are complementary for localization, mixing the stable and continuous estimation provided by range sensors with the precise but infrequent measurements from the visual markers. Real experiments involving an aerial robot and radio/visual markers have been used to validate the approach.