Visible/Thermal-Infrared Hybrid Sensor System for On-Orbit Service Robot

This paper presents development of a preliminary model of a visible/thermal-infrared sensor for an on-orbit service robot. Visible and thermal-infrared sensors fused together function as super-eyes of the robot. As the result of the experiments, it is confirmed that diagnoses of the space instruments can be more efficiently carried out by fusion of visible and thermal-infrared image sensors. Furthermore, satellites or flying objects can be visualized by estimating their position and attitude from thermal-infrared images and can be displayed by superimposing visible images in the database on them, even if they are in eclipse and obscured by shade.