Robotic autonomous exploration SLAM using combination of Kinect and laser scanner

Frontier-based exploration is the most common approach to exploration, a fundamental problem in robotics. Laser scanner and Kinect have been widely used in robotic application for simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) separately. The paper proposes a method to combine the data from Kinect and laser scanner to perform a Frontier-based exploration SLAM. The 2 sensors will be installed facing forward and facing backward in opposite directions which make robot have wider vision, thus the robot can detect more complex surrounding features to increase the exploration efficiency and to construct a more accurate map of the unknown environment.