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Synthesis of Controllers to Create, Maintain, and Reconfigure Robot Formations with Communication Constraints

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Robotics Research

Part of the book series: Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics ((STAR,volume 70))

Abstract

We address the synthesis of controllers for groups of multi-robot systems that enable them to create desired labelled formations andmaintain those formations while travelling through an environmentwith obstacles, with constraints on communication. We assume that individuals in a group are capable of close coordination via high bandwidth communication, but coordination across groups must be limited because communication links are either sporadic or more expensive.We describe a method for developing feedback controllers that is entirely automatic, and provably correct by construction.We provide a framework with which navigation of multiple groups in environments with obstacles is possible. Our framework enables scaling to many groups of robots.While our paper mainly addresses groups of planar robots in ℝ2, the basic ideas are extensible to ℝ3.

We gratefully acknowledge the support of NSF grants IIS-0413138 and IIS-0427313, ARO grant W911NF-05-1-0219, ONR grants N00014-07-1-0829 and N00014-08-1-0696.

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Ayanian, N., Kumar, V., Koditschek, D. (2011). Synthesis of Controllers to Create, Maintain, and Reconfigure Robot Formations with Communication Constraints. In: Pradalier, C., Siegwart, R., Hirzinger, G. (eds) Robotics Research. Springer Tracts in Advanced Robotics, vol 70. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-19457-3_37

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-19457-3_37

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-19456-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-19457-3

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