부산대학교 도서관

This research effort proposes to use an avalanche beacon to search victims in a disaster field. An avalanche beacon is the device that a mountain climber is equipped with in a snowy situation, which is used to find the climber when he/she is caught in an avalanche. By examining a magnetic field generated by the avalanche beacon, rescuers can search for and approach victims buried under snow. At 457 kHz, the wavelength of the beacon is relatively long; thus, attenuation of the wave in snow, water, and, dirt reduces. Because of this characteristic, it performs well not only in avalanches, but also in the other disaster fields such as landslides, floods, and, tsunamis. However, when an avalanche beacon installed on a robot is used to search such rubble or a collapsed building, consideration must be given to the influence of magnetic substances, metals, and devices on the robot that transmit electromagnetic waves. In this study, we validate the effectiveness of using an avalanche beacon in searching for a victim when a mobile robot is used to bring the beacon into the disaster field. For validation, we use simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) to observe the magnetic field generated by the transmitter beacon and received by the receiver beacon installed on the robot travelling a search. The receiver beacon installed on the robot could find the transmitter beacon for all trials. The results are listed below: 1) Electric devices and magnetic substances on the robot did not influence the search using the beacon. 2) Though the magnetic field generated by the transmitter beacon was influenced by the electric devices used to search the environment, the robot could find the beacon. 3) A map and a path of the searched field were provided by SLAM, which was clarified the tendency of the magnetic field.