Advanced RFID-Robot With Rotating Antennas for Smart Inventory in High-Density Shelving Systems

This paper presents the development and testing of a robot designed for automated inventory and 3D localization of items in high-density shelving systems. To enhance accuracy in locating UHF-RFID tagged objects by using synthetic aperture-based methods, rotating antennas are installed on the robot. This allows more degrees of freedom in antenna trajectory, by reaching large synthetic apertures that may deliver high-performance localization. The robot can navigate complex environments by utilizing a depth camera and a visual odometry system, and it can effectively avoid obstacles with the help of a Laser Imaging Detection And Ranging system. Extensive testing is conducted in a realistic shop-like scenario where tagged products are placed on either wooden shelves or hung on metal racks. The robot navigation capabilities are verified together with its inventory and localization performance for different visibility conditions of the tagged items.