Path Planning and Trajectory Control of Collaborative Mobile Robots Using Hybrid Control Architecture

Abstract

This paper presents the development and implementation a hybrid control architecture to direct a collective of three X80 mobile robots to multiple user-defined waypoints. The Genetic Algorithm Path Planner created an optimized, reduction in the time to complete the task, path plan for each robot in the collective such that each waypoint was visited once without colliding with a priori obstacles. The deliberative Genetic Algorithm Path Planner was then coupled with a reactive Potential Field Trajectory Planner and kinematic based controller to create a hybrid control architecture allowing the mobile robot to navigate between multiple user-defined waypoints, while avoiding a priori obstacles and obstacles detected using the robots ’ range sensors. The success of this hybrid control architecture was proven through simulation and experimentation using three of Dr. Robot’s ™ wireless X80 mobile robots.