Penelope

The Penelope variant of MAVISS is designed for enhanced 3D perception and mapping using the Livox Mid-360 LiDAR. Compared to the barebone and AC1-based Evander platform, Penelope focuses on high-resolution environment modeling to support advanced navigation, obstacle avoidance, and SLAM research.

Key Characteristics:

• Equipped with Livox Mid-360, a compact 360° LiDAR optimized for UAVs.

• Provides dense point cloud data suitable for real-time mapping.

• Supports integration with Jetson Orin NX for onboard SLAM and perception pipelines.

• Designed for indoor/outdoor autonomous missions, where accurate obstacle detection is critical.

The hardware and software documentation for Penelope goes into detail about the sensor mounting, wiring, ROS 2 drivers, and integration workflows needed to unlock the full potential of the Livox Mid-360 in aerial robotics.