Place Recognition in Forests With Urquhart Tessellations

In this letter, we present a novel descriptor based on Urquhart tessellations derived from the position of trees in a forest. We propose a framework that uses these descriptors to detect previously seen observations and landmark correspondences, even with partial overlap and noise. We run loop closure detection experiments in simulation and real-world data map-merging from different flights of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) in a pine tree forest and show that our method outperforms state-of-the-art approaches in accuracy and robustness.

Automated summary

A novel descriptor based on Urquhart tessellations is presented, which is derived from the position of trees in a forest. The proposed framework demonstrates superior accuracy and robustness in loop closure detection experiments for map-merging from different flights of a UAV in a pine tree forest.