Composite clustering normal distribution transform algorithm

• Main Authors: Tian Liu, Jiongzhi Zheng, Zhenting Wang, Zhengdong Huang, Yongfu Chen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: SAGE Publishing 2020-05-01
• Series: International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems
• Online Access: https://doi.org/10.1177/1729881420912142

Scan registration is a fundamental step for the simultaneous localization and mapping of mobile robot. The accuracy of scan registration is critical for the quality of mapping and the accuracy of robot navigation. During all of the scan registration methods, normal distribution transform is an efficient and wild-using one. But normal distribution transform will lead to the unreasonable interruption when splitting the grid and can’t express the points’ local geometric feature by prefixed grid. In this article, we propose a novel method, composite clustering normal distribution transform, which comprises the density-based clustering and k -means clustering to aggregate the points with similar local distributing feature. It takes singular value decomposition to judge the suitable degree of one cluster for further division. Meanwhile, to avoid the radiating phenomenon of LIDAR in measuring the points’ distance, we propose a method based on trigonometric to measure the internal distance. The clustering method in composite clustering normal distribution transform could ensure the expression of LIDAR’s local distribution and matching accuracy. The experimental result demonstrates that our method is more accurate and more stable than the normal distribution transform and iterative closest point methods.