이미지 소나를 활용한 3차원 해저 매핑 및 수중로봇 위치 추정 방법

Abstract

This paper proposes a 3D sonar mapping method and autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) localization method using an imaging sonar. The 2D sonar images are registered to generate a 2D mosaic sonar map. In this process, we can estimate the displacement and rotation relationship between the sonar image pairs, and use this to estimate the movement of the AUV. A 3D point cloud is generated from 2D sonar image sequences. This method takes advantage of the mobility of the AUV to reconstruct the height information, and partially solves the ambiguity issues in the elevation angle of the imaging sonar. The height map is generated by accumulating the 3D point cloud. By fusing two maps, we can generate a 3D sonar map. We verified the proposed method by conducting an indoor water tank experiment and field test. Hovering type AUV 'Cyclops' was used to scan seabed and objects, then successfully produced 3D maps.