Multi-Floor Exploration for Ground Robots via an Incremental Reachable Graph and Structural Priors

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Zhu, Zhiwen, Chen, Jiaqi, Huang, Xiangyi, Hu, Meiqi, Zhou, Boyu
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Zhu, Zhiwen
Chen, Jiaqi
Huang, Xiangyi
Hu, Meiqi
Zhou, Boyu
author_facet Zhu, Zhiwen
Chen, Jiaqi
Huang, Xiangyi
Hu, Meiqi
Zhou, Boyu
contents Autonomous exploration of multi-floor buildings remains challenging for ground robots because conventional 2D and 2.5D maps cannot represent overlapping traversable surfaces such as stairs, ramps, and multiple reachable elevations. This letter presents a multi-floor exploration framework based on an incremental reachable graph. Built as a sparse graph over reachable support surfaces, the graph preserves potentially valid connectivity through tentative graph elements under sparse observations and enables stable, physically reachable frontier detection. To guide exploration beyond the currently mapped floor, we project task-zone priors from an explored floor to initialize a hypothetical graph on the target floor and reconcile it incrementally with incoming observations. A hierarchical planner then jointly reasons over confirmed and hypothetical structures for global guidance. In simulation, the proposed method demonstrates improved exploration efficiency and mapping completeness compared to evaluated baselines. Furthermore, onboard real-world experiments validate its practical feasibility and real-time performance.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2605_23350
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Multi-Floor Exploration for Ground Robots via an Incremental Reachable Graph and Structural Priors
Zhu, Zhiwen
Chen, Jiaqi
Huang, Xiangyi
Hu, Meiqi
Zhou, Boyu
Robotics
Autonomous exploration of multi-floor buildings remains challenging for ground robots because conventional 2D and 2.5D maps cannot represent overlapping traversable surfaces such as stairs, ramps, and multiple reachable elevations. This letter presents a multi-floor exploration framework based on an incremental reachable graph. Built as a sparse graph over reachable support surfaces, the graph preserves potentially valid connectivity through tentative graph elements under sparse observations and enables stable, physically reachable frontier detection. To guide exploration beyond the currently mapped floor, we project task-zone priors from an explored floor to initialize a hypothetical graph on the target floor and reconcile it incrementally with incoming observations. A hierarchical planner then jointly reasons over confirmed and hypothetical structures for global guidance. In simulation, the proposed method demonstrates improved exploration efficiency and mapping completeness compared to evaluated baselines. Furthermore, onboard real-world experiments validate its practical feasibility and real-time performance.
title Multi-Floor Exploration for Ground Robots via an Incremental Reachable Graph and Structural Priors
topic Robotics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.23350