Disinfecting Omni Directional Mobile Robot with Vision Capabilities
Mechatronics is the broad term for integrating mechanical, telecommunication, and computer engineering, frequently using microcontrollers. After the COVID breakdown in Pakistan, we saw how rapidly it spread and the loopholes in the Pakistani health sector. We don?t have any technology that will disi
2025-06-28 16:26:43 - Adil Khan
Disinfecting Omni Directional Mobile Robot with Vision Capabilities
Project Area of Specialization RoboticsProject SummaryMechatronics is the broad term for integrating mechanical, telecommunication, and computer engineering, frequently using microcontrollers. After the COVID breakdown in Pakistan, we saw how rapidly it spread and the loopholes in the Pakistani health sector. We don’t have any technology that will disinfect the air and surfaces and we were using the traditional methods like manual wiping or spraying etc.
Due to this reason, we selected such a project combining mechanical, electronics, and Programming. We are going to design a disinfecting mobile robot with omnidirectional movement that uses image processing to follow a dedicated path regardless of the change in direction required and uses Ultraviolet rays from the UV light tubes to disinfect everything in its path and disinfect the entire room. The basic objective of the project is to design a mobile robot that has high mobility and can move in every direction to follow a dedicated path that can be used to disinfect those places where the presence of bacteria, viruses, or germs is not tolerable like Hospitals, Laboratories or Research Labs.
In previous robots, we can see the front and back linear motions of the wheels in many robots constrain the motion of the robots and they aren’t able to reach certain places.
This proposed project is an omnidirectional mobile robot that will be designed such that it will use controllers, a camera for image processing to avoid any obstacle in its path, and actuators all communicating with one another to rotate the wheels of the robot individually to achieve the desired linear and rotatory motion to avoid any obstacles in the path of the robot and clean all the bacteria and germs in the room that might be harmful to humans. The main benefit of this disinfecting mobile robot will be its increased mobility due to the combined effect of its rotatory and linear motion. This increased mobility combined with a set of ultraviolet light rays and a camera in the front which uses image processing to detect any object in its path and avoid it to disinfect an entire targeted area and allow it to access areas where conventional robots and humans can’t go.
Project ObjectivesThe following are the main objectives of this project:
- Design a mobile robot that will execute both linear and rotatory movement.
- Design a mobile robot that will use a simple mechanism to transmit power to wheels.
- Design a mobile robot that will disinfect bacteria, viruses, and germs in hospitals, laboratories, and research labs.
- Design a Disinfecting mobile robot that will automate the health sector of Pakistan
The primary component that will initiate this process of rotation of the wheel at a certain angle is the camera of this robot which will act as the sensor for this control system. The camera will act as the switch of this system because when the camera sees nothing and no information is being given to the microprocessor, the robot will continue to move in a straight path. But, as soon as some visuals are picked up by the camera of some obstacle in the way then it will convey that information to the microprocessor which will then do its function to avoid that particular obstacle. The next component of this system to be activated after receiving the input signal from the sensor will be given to the microprocessor. The microprocessor which we are using in this system is a Raspberry Pi microprocessor and it will be programmed using python programming specifically for the type of actuators that will be attached to this system. The microprocessor in this system can be said to act as the messenger as it takes the signal from the input that is the camera and then uses that signal to the controller, for which we shall use an Arduino that will control the rotation of motors. The image picked up by the camera module is processed by the microprocessor using python programming code embedded in it. This will convert the image signal from the camera and transfer it to the microcontroller in a form that it will understand to control the Servo and DC gear motors that are used for the motion of this omnidirectional robot. The final component of this system is actuators. Two kinds of motors are being used in this mobile robot: the Servo motor and a simple DC gear motor. These two input actuators are because the Servo motors act as the steering motor and the DC gear motor acts as the driving motor for this omnidirectional mobile robot. The actuators are controlled with the help of the controller and the processing is done by the microprocessor. After receiving the signal from the controller, the DC gear motor will provide the driving motion for this robot and the steering will be done by the Servo motor as it will change its angle and subsequently the angle of the wheel according to the input signal taken from the camera in the form an image which will be then processed by the raspberry pi microprocessor.
There are three basic categories of Ultraviolet radiation which are used for disinfecting purposes in mobile robots. The three categories are as follows:
- UV- A
- UV-B
- UV-C
The type of Ultraviolet rays we are going to use for disinfecting purposes in our robot is the UV type C rays. This is because the most effective and safe UV radiation for disinfecting is UV-C. The purpose of discussing all this is that a disinfecting mobile robot will move from one point to another and will stay at a particular distance from the wall and for some particular time it will exert UV radiation on the wall or a surface that we want to disinfect.
Benefits of the ProjectThe major benefits of this project, based on what this project was chosen to work on are:
- Revolutionize the health sector of Pakistan
- New Three Wheel Mechanical Structure
- Disinfect Viruses, Bacteria, and germs without any human involvement
- Simple Crown and Pinion Actuation Method for driving wheels
- Omni-Directional motion enables the robot to move in any direction
- Use Machine Vision Technology for path tracking and obstacle avoidance
The basic things required to achieve the omnidirectional motion of caster wheels are two kinds of motors, them being Servo and DC gear control these motors using a microcontroller and use pulleys to transfer the rotation torques and then use image processing to detect the objects in front of the robot and tell the motor to rotate or stop accordingly so that it would follow a dedicated path and use the Ultraviolet rays to disinfect the entire area in its pathway and make it safe for humans to enter and do their work in a germ-free and disinfected area.
The final deliverables contain:
- Complete Three-Wheel Mechanical Structure made of Steel
- Crown and Pinion Mechanism linked with each wheel
- Servo Motors
- DC gear Motors
- Arduino Mega
- Round Wheels made of Teflon
- DC motor Driver Modules
- Ultra-Sonic Sensors
- Jumper Wires
- Connecting Wires
- Raspberry Pi 3B+
- Raspberry Pi Camera Module
- Voltage Regulators
- Vero Board
- Buck Converter
- Gyro Sensor
- LCD Display
- 3D Printed Upper Casing
| Item Name | Type | No. of Units | Per Unit Cost (in Rs) | Total (in Rs) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total in (Rs) | 73224 | |||
| Servo Motor | Equipment | 7 | 500 | 3500 |
| DC Motor | Equipment | 3 | 200 | 600 |
| Motor Driver | Equipment | 3 | 290 | 870 |
| Female to Female Wire | Equipment | 40 | 3 | 100 |
| Male to Female Wire | Equipment | 80 | 3 | 200 |
| Male to Male Wire | Equipment | 80 | 3 | 240 |
| Arduino Mega | Equipment | 1 | 2800 | 2800 |
| 12V DC Supply | Equipment | 1 | 1800 | 1800 |
| Camera | Equipment | 1 | 780 | 780 |
| Raspberry Pi 3B+ | Equipment | 1 | 18000 | 18000 |
| Raspberry Pi Body | Equipment | 1 | 300 | 300 |
| Memory Card | Equipment | 1 | 550 | 550 |
| Timing Pulley with Timing Belt | Equipment | 6 | 964 | 5784 |
| Crown and Pinion | Equipment | 3 | 4000 | 12000 |
| Teflon Wheels | Equipment | 3 | 1000 | 3000 |
| Ultra Sonic Sensor | Equipment | 4 | 150 | 600 |
| MPU 6050 Gyro Sensor | Equipment | 1 | 350 | 350 |
| LM 7805 | Equipment | 5 | 20 | 100 |
| Vero Board | Equipment | 1 | 50 | 50 |
| 9A 5V Buck Converter | Equipment | 1 | 900 | 900 |
| Soldering Wire | Equipment | 1 | 200 | 200 |
| Connection Wire | Equipment | 1 | 200 | 200 |
| LCD Display | Equipment | 1 | 300 | 300 |
| 3D Printed Casing | Equipment | 1 | 1000 | 1000 |
| Steel Sheet | Equipment | 1 | 7000 | 7000 |
| Manufacturing Cost | Equipment | 1 | 6000 | 6000 |
| Thesis Printing | Miscellaneous | 1 | 5000 | 5000 |
| Travelling | Miscellaneous | 1 | 1000 | 1000 |