MARVIN: Mobile Autonomous Robot Vehicle for Investigation & Navigation

Self-driving vehicles are a rising field for investigation; both in the commercial and academic world, but most framework platforms currently are not designed for the Latin American infrastructure environment, especially in manufacturing costs and their implementation. Therefore, this project involves designing, building, and programming a scaled self-driving vehicle based on the ROS2 infrastructure to make a more economical alternative for this market. SLAM tools were implemented in the prototype so that it could map its environment in real-time and self-navigate through it. In addition, a 3D model and a Gazebo based simulation were developed as the real environment test, so that the user can test the prototype in a simulated. All this research including the list of the parts necessary for the development of the car and the open-source architecture are uploaded to a GitHub repository. The final cost is comparably lower than its competition, therefore, this product can be considered a viable alternative as a learning platform in the actual market maintaining the characteristics of autonomous vehicles.