グラフ上の反応拡散方程式を用いた環境探索経路計画

抄録

In this paper, region-exploration planning algorithm is proposed for a mobile robot to measure shape and pose of several objects in a restricted working environment. The exploration task is modeled as a problem of generating minimal-cost path, in which a robot goes through several sensing positions that satisfy the following condition: any point in a working environment should be within a fixed distance from at least one corresponding sensing position. Both the number of the sensing positions and the path length should be minimized. The proposed algorithm has two characteristics; efficiency in calculation cost and adaptability to dynamic environmental changes. It can be realized with the combination of (a) distributed sensing-position arrangement algorithm by using a reaction-diffusion equation on a graph, and (b) generation of a Hamiltonian cycle that connects all sensing positions. The sensing positions dynamically change their locations in accordance with the recognized environmental situation. The calculation cost for path generation is shown to be O(N^1.5), where N is the number of the sensing positions. The effectiveness of the proposed method is shown by simulations. Experiments are also made with a real robot in indoor environment with three objects.