Development of an Automated Wheelchair for Visually Impaired People

This paper presents the development of an automated wheelchair, a mobility-assistive device that helps visually impaired people in the community. For such people, there are many constraints associated while moving to their desired destination. One of the main objectives of the current work is to design and develop a low-cost smart wheelchair that navigates to its destination autonomously. This smart navigation system (SNS) uses a machine vision technique for localization and path planning and proximity sensors for obstacle avoidance. The wheelchair can autonomously navigate to the location selected by the user through a braille keypad interface. The mechanical design is focused to make a finished product that is stable and according to basic medical considerations. The hardware design in the paper aims to enable a visually impaired person to perform daily routine tasks without the need for any assistance.