Planet surface simulation for testing vision-based autonomous planetary landers

TY - GEN

T1 - Planet surface simulation for testing vision-based autonomous planetary landers

AU - Parkes, S.

AU - Dunstan, M.

AU - Martin, I.

AU - Mendham, P.

AU - Mancuso, S.

PY - 2006

Y1 - 2006

N2 - ESA is planning a series of robotic missions to Mars, the safe delivery of which will be greatly assisted by landing systems capable of autonomous navigation and hazard detection and avoidance. Vision-based navigation is a promising technique which is currently being developed by ESA. The testing of vision-based navigation systems can benefit from computer-based planet surface simulations representative of the target planetary body. PANGU (Planet and Asteroid Natural Scene Generation Utility) is a software tool for simulating and visualising the surface of various planetary bodies. PANGU builds a planet surface model starting with a predefined surface or a fractal surface generated by PANGU. Craters are placed on the terrain according to user defined parameters, combining idealised mathematical models with fractal techniques to produce a realistic appearance. Boulders, sand dunes and other small scale features may then be added. Given the position and orientation of a camera, PANGU generates the corresponding image accounting for illumination conditions. PANGU has been designed to give a high degree of realism while operating at near real-time speeds. As well as cameras, scanning LIDAR and radar altimeters may also be simulated, allowing a comprehensive evaluation of various navigation sensor combinations and redundancy schemes for planetary landers.

AB - ESA is planning a series of robotic missions to Mars, the safe delivery of which will be greatly assisted by landing systems capable of autonomous navigation and hazard detection and avoidance. Vision-based navigation is a promising technique which is currently being developed by ESA. The testing of vision-based navigation systems can benefit from computer-based planet surface simulations representative of the target planetary body. PANGU (Planet and Asteroid Natural Scene Generation Utility) is a software tool for simulating and visualising the surface of various planetary bodies. PANGU builds a planet surface model starting with a predefined surface or a fractal surface generated by PANGU. Craters are placed on the terrain according to user defined parameters, combining idealised mathematical models with fractal techniques to produce a realistic appearance. Boulders, sand dunes and other small scale features may then be added. Given the position and orientation of a camera, PANGU generates the corresponding image accounting for illumination conditions. PANGU has been designed to give a high degree of realism while operating at near real-time speeds. As well as cameras, scanning LIDAR and radar altimeters may also be simulated, allowing a comprehensive evaluation of various navigation sensor combinations and redundancy schemes for planetary landers.

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/41149092204

U2 - 10.2514/MIAF06

DO - 10.2514/MIAF06

M3 - Conference contribution

AN - SCOPUS:41149092204

SN - 9781605600390

VL - 3

SP - 1512

EP - 1520

BT - 57th International Astronautical Congress, IAC 2006

PB - American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

T2 - 57th International Astronautical Congress 2006, IAC 2006

Y2 - 2 October 2006 through 6 October 2006

ER -