Patent ID: 11945124
Assignee: STMICROELECTRONICS (RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT) LIMITED
Field: Control (Instruments)
Classification: CPC B  G | IPC B  G

Claim 11:
12. A system comprising:
an image sensor for attachment to a mobile robot and configured to capture an image of a scene in a movement path of the mobile robot, the image comprising image information for each of a plurality of pixels of the scene, the image information comprising respective intensity values and respective distance values for each pixel of the plurality of pixels, wherein the image sensor is a single time-of-flight sensor configured to determine both the respective intensity values and the respective distance values for each pixel of the plurality of pixels; and
a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing a computer program, the computer program comprising instructions that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations comprising:
accessing the image information;
analyzing the image information to determine whether to modify the movement path of the mobile robot, wherein a target movement path of the mobile robot is a line on a floor, wherein the line comprises a plurality of line segments separated by intervening gaps, and wherein analyzing the image information to determine whether to modify the movement path of the mobile robot comprises analyzing the respective intensity values for each pixel of the plurality of pixels to detect a line on a floor and analyzing the respective distance values for each pixel of the plurality of pixels to detect an obstacle in the movement path of the mobile robot;
initiating, in response to determining according to the image information to modify the movement path of the mobile robot, sending of a command to a drive subsystem of the mobile robot to modify the movement path of the mobile robot;
detecting, according to the respective intensity values for each pixel of the plurality of pixels, a first line segment at a first time, the first line segment associated with a first distance according to the respective distance values for each pixel of the plurality of pixels;
detecting, according to updated intensity values, the first line segment at a second time, the first line segment associated with a second distance according to updated distance values; and
calculating a velocity of the mobile robot based on the first distance, the second distance, the first time, and the second time.