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JRM Vol.25 No.3 pp. 484-496
doi: 10.20965/jrm.2013.p0484
(2013)

Paper:

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Autonomous Pedestrian Push Button Activation by Outdoor Mobile Robot in Outdoor Environments

Aneesh N. Chand* and Shin’ichi Yuta**

*Institute of Mechatronic Systems, Zurich University of Applied Sciences, Technikumstrasse 5, CH 8401, Winterthur, Switzerland

**Department of Electrical Engineering, Shibaura Institute of Technology, 3-7-5 Toyosu, Koto-ku, Tokyo 135-8548, Japan

Received:
October 3, 2012
Accepted:
April 17, 2013
Published:
June 20, 2013
Creative Commons License
Keywords:
autonomous button activation, outdoor mobile robot, outdoor environment
Abstract
The authors have developed an outdoor mobile robot that has the ability to cross roads at an intersection or pedestrian crossing fully autonomously while traveling along sidewalks in an urban environment. This gives the robot the capability to travel longer and complex routes as the robot is able to cross a road and continue with its path. The developed robot has the unique ability to autonomously approach and activate the pedestrian push button with a mechanical finger. We first briefly describe the overall operation of such a road crossing robot. The rest of this paper then discusses in detail how the robot can meticulously navigate to and activate the pedestrian push button with the on-board finger. The contribution of this work is that although there are robots existing that perform precision docking or button activation, this robot is one of the few that can perform such an action in a real world outdoor environment that is completely unmodified. We prove this by deploying the robot in a real world road-crossing and it was successfully able to engage the pedestrian push button.
Cite this article as:
A. Chand and S. Yuta, “Autonomous Pedestrian Push Button Activation by Outdoor Mobile Robot in Outdoor Environments,” J. Robot. Mechatron., Vol.25 No.3, pp. 484-496, 2013.
Data files:
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