Real-time motion planning for mobile robots by means of artificial potential field method in unknown environment

Purpose ‐ The purpose of this paper is to focus on the local minima issue encountered in motion planning by the artificial potential field (APF) method, investigate the currently existing approaches and analyze four types of previous methods. Based on the conclusions of analysis, this paper presents an improved wall-following approach for real-time application in mobile robots. Design/methodology/approach ‐ In the proposed method, new switching conditions among various behaviors are reasonably designed in order to guarantee the reliability and the generality of the method. In addition, path memory is incorporated in this method to enhance the robot's cognition capability to the environment. Therefore, the new method greatly weakens the blindness of decision making of robot and it is very helpful to select appropriate behaviors facing to the changeable situation. Comparing with the previous methods which are normally considering specific obstacles, the effectiveness of this proposed method for the environment with convex polygon-shaped obstacles has been theoretically proved. The simulation and experimental results further demonstrate that the proposed method is adaptable for the environment with convex polygon-shaped obstacles or non-convex polygon-shaped obstacles. It has more widely generality and adaptiveness than other existed methods in complicated unknown environment. Findings ‐ The proposed method can effectively realize real time motion planning with high reliability and generality. The cognition capability of mobile robot to the environment can be improved in order to adapt to the changeable situation. The proposed method can be suitable to more complex unknown environment. It is more applicable for actual environment comparing with other traditional APF methods. Originality/value ‐ This paper has widely investigated the currently existed approaches and analyzes deeply on four types of traditional APF methods adopted for real time motion planning in unknown environment with simulation works. Based on the conclusions of analysis, this paper presents an improved wall-following approach. The proposed method can realize real time motion planning considering more complex environment with high reliability and generality. The simulation and experimental results further demonstrate that the proposed method is adaptable for the environment with convex polygon-shaped obstacles or non-convex polygon-shaped obstacles. It has more widely generality and adaptiveness than other existed methods in complicated unknown environment.