This award, in the Small Grants for Exploratory Research mode, funds an investigation into the potential capabilities of an omnidirectional vision sensor to provide guidance and control information for a mobile robot. The work will explore several basic questions: (1) can scene interpretation for navigation and object recognition be carried out efficiently on "raw" omnidirectional images, or is it necessary to compensate for the distortions inherent in such images; and (2) how best to use image invariants in omnidirectional vision to minimize computation in robotic navigation. Exploratory error studies and experimental validation of the omnidirectional approach will also be carried out. Ultimately this research is expected to develop a theoretical foundation for omnidirectional vision control of a mobile robot.
