Multiple mobile robots motion-planning: An approach with space-time MCA

In this paper is described a fast Path-Planner for Multi-robot composed by mobile robots having generic shapes and sizes (user defined) and different kinematics. We have developed an algorithm that computes the shortest collision-free path for each robot, from the starting pose to the goal pose, while considering their real shapes, avoiding the collisions with the static obstacles and the other robots. It is based on a directional (anisotropic) propagation of attracting potential values in a 4D Space-Time, using a Multilayered Cellular Automata (MCA) architecture. This algorithm makes a search for all the optimal collision-free trajectories following the minimum valley of a potential hypersurface embedded in a 5D space.