RoboCupRescue - Robot League Team KURT3D, Germany

A mobile robot named KURT3D was developed at the Fraunhofer Institute for Autonomous Intelligent Systems during the last three years. The key innovation of this system lies in the capability for autonomous or operatorassisted 6D SLAM (simultaneous localization and mapping) and 3D map generation of natural scenes. Hence, KURT3D already meets the basic requirement regarding urban search and rescue. For the rescue robot league competition, it is additionally configured with dedicated state-of-the-art equipment. The robot and the operator station are rather compact and easy to set up. The operator uses a joystick as a remote control for the robot and can watch a live video of the scene where the robot drives. Data are transmitted via wireless LAN. A 3D laser scanner, which is mounted on an outdoor variant of KURT3D, is used as the main sensor for map generation as well as for navigation and localization. The whole system has been used with a proven record of success for different tasks of map building, so that we are confident of managing the rescue robot league competition, too.