The here presented flying system uses two pairs of wide-angle stereo cameras and maps a large area of interest in a short amount of time. We present a multicopter system equipped with two pairs of wide-angle stereo cameras and an inertial measurement unit (IMU) for robust visual-inertial navigation and time-efficient omni-directional 3D mapping. The four cameras cover a 240 degree stereo field of view (FOV) vertically, which makes the system also suitable for cramped and confined environments like caves. In our approach, we synthesize eight virtual pinhole cameras from four wide-angle cameras. Each of the resulting four synthesized pinhole stereo systems provides input to an independent visual odometry (VO). Subsequently, the four individual motion estimates are fused with data from an IMU, based on their consistency with the state estimation. We describe the configuration and image processing of the vision system as well as the sensor fusion and mapping pipeline on board the MAV. We demonstrate the robustness of our multi-VO approach for visual-inertial navigation and present results of a 3D-mapping experiment.

Despite the progress since the first attempts of mankind to explore space, it appears that sending man in space remains challenging. While robotic systems are not yet ready to replace human presence, they provide an excellent support for astronauts during maintenance and hazardous tasks. This paper presents the development of a space qualified multi-fingered robotic hand and highlights the most interesting challenges. The design concept, the mechanical structure, the electronics architecture and the control system are presented throughout this overview paper.