Compact and Efficient Topological Mapping for Large-Scale Environment with Pruned Voronoi Diagram

Abstract

Topological maps generated in complex and irregular unknown environments are meaningful for autonomous robots’ navigation. To obtain the skeleton of the environment without obstacle polygon extraction and clustering, we propose a method to obtain high-quality topological maps using only pure Voronoi diagrams in three steps. Supported by Voronoi vertex’s property of the largest empty circle, the method updates the global topological map incrementally in both dynamic and static environments online. The incremental method can be adapted to any fundamental Voronoi diagram generator. We maintain the entire space by two graphs, the pruned Voronoi graph for incremental updates and the reduced approximated generalized Voronoi graph for routing planning requests. We present an extensive benchmark and real-world experiment, and our method completes the environment representation in both indoor and outdoor areas. The proposed method generates a compact topological map in both small- and large-scale scenarios, which is defined as the total length and vertices of topological maps. Additionally, our method has been shortened by several orders of magnitude in terms of the total length and consumes less than 30% of the average time cost compared to state-of-the-art methods.

Map representations for mobile robot localization

“…The topological maps based on a generalized Voronoi diagram forms a network of topological relationshipships by dividing the environment into multiple regions. Each region is associated with specific landmarks or topological relationshipships, and the boundaries between these regions are usually determined by the shortest path or reachability between landmarks; In order to obtain the structure of the environment without obstacle polygon extraction and clustering, Yao Qi et al [39] proposed a three-step method to obtain a high-quality topological graph by using a pure Voronoi diagram. This method can incrementally update the global topology graph online in dynamic and static environments.…”

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“…For the comparison of the elements of each origin, for computational efficiency reasons, the centroids of the cadastral parcels (CP) were superimposed on areas of influence around the NGO-CAE place names. For areas where the parcel extension was large, it was decided to generate a continuous surface of the Voronoi diagram, as has been used in other recent cartographic works [96][97][98]; these are usually forestry and pasture areas. In most cases, the municipality owns the land, either as public domain or as patrimonial land.…”

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