DTAA: A Detect, Track and Avoid Architecture for navigation in spaces with Multiple Velocity Objects

Abstract

Proactive collision avoidance measures are imperative in environments where humans and robots coexist. Moreover, the introduction of high quality legged robots into workplaces highlighted the crucial role of a robust, fully autonomous safety solution for robots to be viable in shared spaces or in co-existence with humans. This article establishes for the first time ever an innovative Detect-Track-and-Avoid Architecture (DTAA) to enhance safety and overall mission performance. The proposed novel architectyre has the merit ot integrating object detection using YOLOv8, utilizing Ultralytics embedded object tracking, and state estimation of tracked objects through Kalman filters. Moreover, a novel heuristic clustering is employed to facilitate active avoidance of multiple closely positioned objects with similar velocities, creating sets of unsafe spaces for the Nonlinear Model Predictive Controller (NMPC) to navigate around. The NMPC identifies the most hazardous unsafe space, considering not only their current positions but also their predicted future locations. In the sequel, the NMPC calculates maneuvers to guide the robot along a path planned by D$^{*}_{+}$ towards its intended destination, while maintaining a safe distance to all identified obstacles. The efficacy of the novelly suggested DTAA framework is being validated by Real-life experiments featuring a Boston Dynamics Spot robot that demonstrates the robot's capability to consistently maintain a safe distance from humans in dynamic subterranean, urban indoor, and outdoor environments.