Automated guided vehicles and autonomous mobile robots for recognition and tracking in civil engineering

Automated guided vehicles (AGVs) and autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) have been widely used recently to solve various engineering problems in logistics, manufacturing, and high-risk labor. This paper reviews the latest research on AGVs and AMRs and includes results from different past and present research areas on AGVs and AMRs. In addition, various navigation principles of AGV are compared. This paper also discusses and compares various types of AGV/AMR visual tracking control technologies and presents three recognition and tracking integration technologies, which improve the accuracy, robustness, and real-time performance of AGV/AMR visual navigation systems. Finally, the application of AGV/AMR technologies in civil engineering is reviewed and discussed, including for road pavements, bridges, and construction. These technologies play an important role in construction, defect detection, and condition inspection, free up manpower and improve the degree of automation in the civil engineering industry.