Object search on a mobile robot using relational spatial information

We present a method for utilising knowledge of qualitative spatial rela- tions between objects in order to facilitate efficient visual search for those objects. A computational model for the relation is used to sample a probability distribution that guides the selection of camera views. Specifically we examine the spatial rela- tion “on”, in the sense of physical support, and show its usefulness in search exper- iments on a real robot. We also experimentally compare different search strategies and verify the efficiency of so-called indirect search.