NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture

This thesis describes a program of research aimed at the creation of an unmanned ground vehicle. In this research the Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture (NOVA) was developed along with the ARP (Autonomous Route Proving vehicle. NOVA is a control architecture for a vehicle with the role of auto...

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Main Author: Strachan, Jamie Robert
Format: Thesis (University of Nottingham only)
Language:English
Published: 2009
Subjects:
Online Access:https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/10842/
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author Strachan, Jamie Robert
author_facet Strachan, Jamie Robert
author_sort Strachan, Jamie Robert
building Nottingham Research Data Repository
collection Online Access
description This thesis describes a program of research aimed at the creation of an unmanned ground vehicle. In this research the Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture (NOVA) was developed along with the ARP (Autonomous Route Proving vehicle. NOVA is a control architecture for a vehicle with the role of autonomous route proving in natural terrain. The ARP vehicle was constructed to demonstrate this architecture. NOVA includes all the required competence for the ARP vehicle to be deployed in unknown outdoor environments. The architecture embodies systems for vehicle localisation, autonomous navigation and obstacle avoidance. The localisation system fuses data from absolute and relative localisation equipment. GPS provides the absolute position of the ARP vehicle. Relative position information is derived from wheel encoders and a pose sensor. NOVA uses a probabilistic technique known as a particle filter to combine the two position estimates. NOVA maintains a local obstacle map based on range data generated by the perception sensors on the ARP vehicle. Analysis is performed on this map to find any untraversable terrain. A local path planner then selects the best path for the vehicle to follow using the map. Decisions made by the path planner are recorded to allow the vehicle to backtrack and try another path if NOVA later finds the chosen route is blocked. NOVA has been extensively tested onboard the ARP vehicle. Results from a series of experiments are presented to validate the various parts of the architecture.
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spelling nottingham-108422025-02-28T11:09:55Z https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/10842/ NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture Strachan, Jamie Robert This thesis describes a program of research aimed at the creation of an unmanned ground vehicle. In this research the Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture (NOVA) was developed along with the ARP (Autonomous Route Proving vehicle. NOVA is a control architecture for a vehicle with the role of autonomous route proving in natural terrain. The ARP vehicle was constructed to demonstrate this architecture. NOVA includes all the required competence for the ARP vehicle to be deployed in unknown outdoor environments. The architecture embodies systems for vehicle localisation, autonomous navigation and obstacle avoidance. The localisation system fuses data from absolute and relative localisation equipment. GPS provides the absolute position of the ARP vehicle. Relative position information is derived from wheel encoders and a pose sensor. NOVA uses a probabilistic technique known as a particle filter to combine the two position estimates. NOVA maintains a local obstacle map based on range data generated by the perception sensors on the ARP vehicle. Analysis is performed on this map to find any untraversable terrain. A local path planner then selects the best path for the vehicle to follow using the map. Decisions made by the path planner are recorded to allow the vehicle to backtrack and try another path if NOVA later finds the chosen route is blocked. NOVA has been extensively tested onboard the ARP vehicle. Results from a series of experiments are presented to validate the various parts of the architecture. 2009-10-15 Thesis (University of Nottingham only) NonPeerReviewed application/pdf en arr https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/10842/1/Microsoft_Word_-_Complete_Thesis_-_issue_M.pdf Strachan, Jamie Robert (2009) NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture. PhD thesis, University of Nottingham. Unmanned ground vehicles localisation obstacle mapping local path planning
spellingShingle Unmanned ground vehicles
localisation
obstacle mapping
local path planning
Strachan, Jamie Robert
NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture
title NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture
title_full NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture
title_fullStr NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture
title_full_unstemmed NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture
title_short NOVA: Nottingham Off-road Vehicle Architecture
title_sort nova: nottingham off-road vehicle architecture
topic Unmanned ground vehicles
localisation
obstacle mapping
local path planning
url https://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/10842/