Efficient Approach for Extracting High-Level B-Spline Features from LIDAR Data for Light-Weight Mapping

Light-weight and accurate mapping is made possible by high-level feature extraction from sensor readings. In this paper, the high-level B-spline features from a 2D LIDAR are extracted with a faster method as a solution to the mapping problem, making it possible for the robot to interact with its environment while navigating. The computation time of feature extraction is very crucial when mobile robots perform real-time tasks. In addition to the existing assessment measures of B-spline feature extraction methods, the paper also includes a new benchmark time metric for evaluating how well the extracted features perform. For point-to-point association, the most reliable vertex control points of the spline features generated from the hints of low-level point feature FALKO were chosen. The standard three indoor and one outdoor data sets were used for the experiment. The experimental results based on benchmark performance metrics, specifically computation time, show that the presented approach achieves better results than the state-of-the-art methods for extracting B-spline features. The classification of the methods implemented in the B-spline features detection and the algorithms are also presented in the paper.