Project Introduction and Team

Meet the Team!

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Background Information

Developing an autonomous mobility system enables the demonstration of the knowledge and skills acquired through WashU’s electrical engineering coursework. Relevant courses include Introduction to Engineering Design (ESE 205) and Control Systems (ESE 441). Introduction to Engineering Design honed programming, data collection, and debugging skills through creating a model applied to feedback control, controlling a car to start at a specific point travel in a straight line following a blue line on the ground, and stop before a blue recycling container. Alternatively, Control Systems deepened control knowledge for implementing a PID loop around specific data.  

Problem Statement

To achieve a fully autonomous RC car which navigates a path, sensors must be integrated with ROS software. Each sensor must take in specific data that corresponds to a specific action of the car. For instance, to navigate a path the car must detect its environment, delineating the sidewalk from grass. For an RC car to detect its environment, the camera, Lidar, or GPS sensor data is gathered. This data gives the car familiarity of its surroundings, creating boundaries of where it can or cannot travel. Another problem to overcome for this project is navigating turns. If the path turns, so must the car. Some sensors that enable the detection of a changing path are the camera, Lidar, or GPS. In ROS, each sensor has a talker that sends data to one listener, where logic is implemented.  

Objectives of the Project

Throughout the development process, we aimed to emphasize the seamless integration of hardware components with software algorithms, striving to optimize the RC car’s autonomy and performance. By leveraging GPS for precise location determination, Lidar for real-time obstacle detection, IMU for improved orientation and stability, and servos for autonomous steering, we aimed to create a comprehensive solution for autonomous mobility. 

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