A Robust Approach for LiDAR-Inertial Odometry Without Sensor-Specific Modeling

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Malladi, Meher V. R., Guadagnino, Tiziano, Lobefaro, Luca, Stachniss, Cyrill
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2025
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author Malladi, Meher V. R.
Guadagnino, Tiziano
Lobefaro, Luca
Stachniss, Cyrill
author_facet Malladi, Meher V. R.
Guadagnino, Tiziano
Lobefaro, Luca
Stachniss, Cyrill
contents Accurate odometry is a critical component in a robotic navigation stack, and subsequent modules such as planning and control often rely on an estimate of the robot's motion. Sensor-based odometry approaches should be robust across sensor types and deployable in different target domains, from solid-state LiDARs mounted on cars in urban-driving scenarios to spinning LiDARs on handheld packages used in unstructured natural environments. In this paper, we propose a robust LiDAR-inertial odometry system that does not rely on sensor-specific modeling. Sensor fusion techniques for LiDAR and inertial measurement unit (IMU) data typically integrate IMU data iteratively in a Kalman filter or use pre-integration in a factor graph framework, combined with LiDAR scan matching often exploiting some form of feature extraction. We propose an alternative strategy that only requires a simplified motion model for IMU integration and directly registers LiDAR scans in a scan-to-map approach. Our approach allows us to impose a novel regularization on the LiDAR registration, improving the overall odometry performance. We detail extensive experiments on a number of datasets covering a wide array of commonly used robotic sensors and platforms. We show that our approach works with the exact same configuration in all these scenarios, demonstrating its robustness. We have open-sourced our implementation so that the community can build further on our work and use it in their navigation stacks.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2509_06593
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A Robust Approach for LiDAR-Inertial Odometry Without Sensor-Specific Modeling
Malladi, Meher V. R.
Guadagnino, Tiziano
Lobefaro, Luca
Stachniss, Cyrill
Robotics
Accurate odometry is a critical component in a robotic navigation stack, and subsequent modules such as planning and control often rely on an estimate of the robot's motion. Sensor-based odometry approaches should be robust across sensor types and deployable in different target domains, from solid-state LiDARs mounted on cars in urban-driving scenarios to spinning LiDARs on handheld packages used in unstructured natural environments. In this paper, we propose a robust LiDAR-inertial odometry system that does not rely on sensor-specific modeling. Sensor fusion techniques for LiDAR and inertial measurement unit (IMU) data typically integrate IMU data iteratively in a Kalman filter or use pre-integration in a factor graph framework, combined with LiDAR scan matching often exploiting some form of feature extraction. We propose an alternative strategy that only requires a simplified motion model for IMU integration and directly registers LiDAR scans in a scan-to-map approach. Our approach allows us to impose a novel regularization on the LiDAR registration, improving the overall odometry performance. We detail extensive experiments on a number of datasets covering a wide array of commonly used robotic sensors and platforms. We show that our approach works with the exact same configuration in all these scenarios, demonstrating its robustness. We have open-sourced our implementation so that the community can build further on our work and use it in their navigation stacks.
title A Robust Approach for LiDAR-Inertial Odometry Without Sensor-Specific Modeling
topic Robotics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2509.06593