Mobile Robot for Telepresence Applications: Design, Construction, and Programming

This work presents a differential drive mobile robot design for telepresence applications. It consists on two independent wheels, which are driven by a brushless motor equipped with Hall effect current sensors for low-level control. Each motor has an associated PID velocity controller. The robot also includes a lidar sensor and a RGB-D camera to improve the environment perception. Several algorithms are included in the main Raspberry Pi 4 central processor working under ROS framework. However, the main control level incorporates a solution for the person following task and a video streaming software to allow telepresence. The robot can be also teleoperated by means of an external joystick. The user interface is based on a touch screen to allow the control and configuration of the different modules. Regarding the mechanical design, the robot consists on several segments built on carbon steel, aluminum, and 3d printing.