Purpose – This paper aims to review the use of imaging technologies in robotics, with an emphasis on inspection applications and the control of autonomous robots. Design/methodology/approach – Following a brief introduction, this paper first considers vision‐based robotic inspection...

Purpose This paper aims to provide an insight into light detection and ranging (lidar) technology and its growing applications in robotics. Design/methodology/approach Following a short introduction, this paper first describes the main lidar techniques and then provides details of a selection of...

Purpose – The purpose of this article is to illustrate how sensors impart perceptive capabilities to robots. This is the second part of a two-part article. This second part considers positional awareness and sensing in the external environment, notably but not exclusively by autonomous, mobile...

Purpose – This article aims to describe euRathlon 2013, the first competitive event in a three-year, EU-funded programme for autonomous robots, which was held in Germany in September 2013. Design/methodology/approach – Following an introduction, this describes the teams and their robots, the...