Implementation of a mobile robot for people following

This work presents the design and implementation of a mobile robot for people following. The mobile robot is moving with three omni-wheels which are driven by DC-motors; the control center is a notebook along with microprocessors BS2p and PIC16F84A. We use image processing technique to recognize the people (master) to be followed and fuzzy logic to control the moving of the mobile robot. Two infrared LEDs are tied in the back of the master and a camera is installed on the robot, then the robot can recognize the LEDs by the camera to “see” where its master is. Moreover, there is an infrared sensor on the top of the robot to estimate the distance between the master and the robot. There are two infrared sensors installed on the right-front and left-front of the robot to detect the obstacle on the way. Three omni-wheels are driven by motors and the motors are controlled by the fuzzy logic to achieve forward, backward moving, and turning. Based on the fuzzy controls on the motors with the aids of adequate sensors, the mobile robot can follow the master with fixed distance and avoid obstacle simultaneously. Finally, a practical experiment is given to demonstrate the performance of the robot.