Two years of Visual Odometry on the Mars Exploration Rovers

Abstract NASA's two Mars Exploration Rovers (MER) have successfully demonstrated a robotic Visual Odometry capability on another world for the first time. This provides each rover with accurate knowledge of its position, allowing it to autonomously detect and compensate for any unforeseen slip encountered during a drive. It has enabled the rovers to drive safely and more effectively in highly sloped and sandy terrains and has resulted in increased mission science return by reducing the number of days required to drive into interesting areas. The MER Visual Odometry system comprises onboard software for comparing stereo pairs taken by the pointable mast‐mounted 45 deg FOV Navigation cameras (NAVCAMs). The…

• NA
  National Aeronautics and Space Administration
• CI
  California Institute of Technology
• JP
  Jet Propulsion Laboratory