Building gas concentration gridmaps with a mobile robot

This paper addresses the problem of mapping the structure of a gas distribution by creating concentration gridmaps from the data collected by a mobile robot equipped with gas sensors. By contrast to metric gridmaps extracted from sonar or laser range scans, a single measurement from a gas sensor provides information about a comparatively small area. To overcome this problem, a mapping technique is introduced that uses a Gaussian weighting function to model the decreasing likelihood that a particular reading represents the true concentration with respect to the distance from the point of measurement. This method is evaluated in terms of its suitability regarding the slow response and recovery of the gas sensors, and experimental comparisons of different exploration strategies are presented. The stability of the mapped structures and the capability to use concentration gridmaps to locate a gas source are also discussed.