Fusion of inertial and kinematic navigation systems for autonomous vehicles

It is expected that an Inertial Navigation System (INS), when used on a land vehicle, would provide a superior position estimate to that which would be determined using odometry. There are a number of benefits to using odometry as opposed to an INS technique, including high physical robustness and reliability of the encoders, low weight, power consumption and cost, and a zero time-dependent drift. It would seem logical to include some form of odometry on any autonomous surface vehicle. If an INS technique is to be implemented, then it follows that an attempt should be made to improve the overall system performance by combining INS and odometry signals into an optimal, or at least more robust, estimation system.