| This monograph covers theoretical aspects of simultaneous localization and map building for mobile robots, such as estimation stability, nonlinear models for the propagation of uncertainties, temporal landmark compatibility, as well as issues pertaining the coupling of control and SLAM. One of the most relevant topics covered in this monograph is the theoretical formalism of partial observability in SLAM. The authors show that the typical approach to SLAM using a Kalman filter results in marginal filter stability, making the final reconstruction estimates dependant on the initial vehicle estimates. However, by anchoring the map to a fixed landmark in the scene, they are able to attain full observability in SLAM, with reduced covariance estimates. This result earned the first author the EURON Georges Giralt Best PhD Award in its fourth edition, and has prompted the SLAM community to think in new ways to approach the mapping problem. For example, by creating local maps anchored on a landmark, or on the robot initial estimate itself, and then using geometric relations to fuse local maps globally. This monograph is appropriate as a text for an introductory estimation-theoretic approach to the SLAM problem, and as a reference book for people who work in mobile robotics research in general.
At the dawn of the new millennium, robotics is undergoing a major transformation in scope and dimension. From a largely dominant industrial focus, robotics is rapidly expanding into the challenges of unstructured environments. Interacting with, assisting, serving, and exploring with humans, the emerging robots will increasingly touch people and their lives.
The goal of the new series of Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics (STAR) is to bring, in a timely fashion, the latest advances and developments in robotics on the basis of their significance and quality. It is our hope that the wider dissemination of research developments will stimulate more exchanges and collaborations among the research community and contribute to further advancement of this rapidly growing field.
The monograph written by Juan Andrade-Cetto and Alberto Sanfeliu is focused on a popular research topic in the latest few years, namely Simultaneous Localization and Map Bulding (SLAM). The estimation theoretical aspects are covered with resort to the widely-adopted Extended Kalman Filtering (EKF) technique. Further to the design of the estimator, the controller design is also discussed in the work along with its implications on closing the perception-action loop. Both simulation and experimental results for indoor mobile robots are presented to show the effectiveness of the proposed methods.
Remarkably, the doctoral thesis at the basis of this monograph received the prize of the Fourth Edition of the EURON Georges Giralt PhD Award devoted to the best PhD thesis in Robotics in Europe. A fine addition to the Series! |