Autonomous Perception and Terrain Reconstruction of Unstructured Lunar Complex Environment: A Review

Lunar surface patrol and exploration is an important way to carry out scientific exploration activities of the extraterrestrial moon. Unstructured lunar environment brings challenges to the patrol and exploration missions. Due to the continuous impact of meteorites and solar wind radiation, the lunar surface is soft and complex in shape. The lunar rover needs to use autonomous terrain perception and three-dimensional (3D) reconstruction techniques to complete the given missions in the unknown lunar surface environment. To this end, this paper summarizes the existing autonomous terrain perception and reconstruction technology in the lunar environment and analyses some works of four sub-techniques. Then, this paper introduces the problems and challenges of the existing technology applied to lunar surface environment, such as unstructured lunar environment, uncertainty of perceived information, complexity of data processing algorithm and immature sensor technology. Finally, the article also points out the future development and effort trends.