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Leveraging Area Bounds Information For Autonomous Multi-Robot Exploration, Tsung-Ming Liu, Damian M. Lyons

Faculty Publications

In this paper we propose an approach, the Space-Based Potential Field (SBPF) approach, to controlling multiple robots for area exploration missions that focus on robot dispersion. The SBPF method is based on a potential field approach that leverages knowledge of the overall bounds of the area to be explored. This additional information allows a simpler potential field control strategy for all robots but which nonetheless has good dispersion and overlap performance in all the multi-robot scenarios while avoiding potential minima. Both simulation and robot experimental results are presented as evidence.