Relative positioning of mobile robots using ultrasounds

For robots to move in formation or to make them cooperate for distributed sensing of an area, they need to be able to discriminate their position relative to each other. Instead of using an absolute positioning approach, we have developed a relative positioning device that allows to perceive the distance and the angle of other nearby devices. The system is based on time-of-flight evaluation of ultrasonic waves and a RF communication link. The approach is validated using two Pioneer 2 robots in a leader-follower configuration.