A Polarized Light Compass Aided Place Recognition System

Many animals are able to derive compass information from the skylight polarization pattern that appears due to scattering of sunlight. In this paper, the polarized light compass, which draws on the highly sensitive visual perception system of the animal, is introduced in the visual place recognition system. This sensor has the advantage of no cumulative heading errors. Firstly, the composition of place recognition system is introduced, then the polarized light compass and its orientation method are described. Finally, the proposed method is tested by the actual vehicle experiment. The experimental results show that heading constraint can improve the accuracy and efficiency of place recognition. Keywords-place recognition; polarized light compass; heading constraint component;