Swarming Behavior Using Probabilistic Roadmap Techniques

While techniques exist for simulating swarming behaviors, these methods usually provide only simplistic navigation and planning capabilities. In this review, we explore the benefits of integrating roadmap-based path planning methods with flocking techniques to achieve different behaviors. We show how group behaviors such as exploring can be facilitated by using dynamic roadmaps (e.g., modifying edge weights) as an implicit means of communication between flock members. Extending ideas from cognitive modeling, we embed behavior rules in individual flock members and in the roadmap. These behavior rules enable the flock members to modify their actions based on their current location and state. We propose new techniques for several distinct group behaviors: homing, exploring (covering and goal searching), passing through narrow areas and shepherding. We present results that show that our methods provide significant improvement over methods that utilize purely local knowledge and moreover, that we achieve performance approaching that which could be obtained by an ideal method that has complete global knowledge. Animations of these behaviors can be viewed on our webpages.

[1]  B. Faverjon,et al.  Probabilistic Roadmaps for Path Planning in High-Dimensional Con(cid:12)guration Spaces , 1996 .

[2]  John W. Lockwood,et al.  A Collision Detection Chip on Reconfigurable Hardware , 2005 .

[3]  Daniel Vallejo,et al.  OBPRM: an obstacle-based PRM for 3D workspaces , 1998 .

[4]  Jean-Claude Latombe,et al.  Robot motion planning , 1970, The Kluwer international series in engineering and computer science.

[5]  Jean-Claude Latombe,et al.  Randomized Kinodynamic Motion Planning with Moving Obstacles , 2002, Int. J. Robotics Res..

[6]  Lydia E. Kavraki,et al.  Path planning using lazy PRM , 2000, Proceedings 2000 ICRA. Millennium Conference. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation. Symposia Proceedings (Cat. No.00CH37065).

[7]  O. Khatib,et al.  Real-Time Obstacle Avoidance for Manipulators and Mobile Robots , 1985, Proceedings. 1985 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation.

[8]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Ligand binding with OBPRM and user input , 2001, Proceedings 2001 ICRA. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.01CH37164).

[9]  Kwee-Bo Sim,et al.  Artificial immune-based swarm behaviors of distributed autonomous robotic systems , 2001, Proceedings 2001 ICRA. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.01CH37164).

[10]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Iterative relaxation of constraints: a framework for improving automated motion planning , 2005, 2005 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems.

[11]  Luca Maria Gambardella,et al.  Ant Algorithms for Discrete Optimization , 1999, Artificial Life.

[12]  Craig W. Reynolds Flocks, herds, and schools: a distributed behavioral model , 1998 .

[13]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Physical Environment , 1998 .

[14]  Demetri Terzopoulos,et al.  Artificial fishes: physics, locomotion, perception, behavior , 1994, SIGGRAPH.

[15]  David C. Brogan,et al.  Group Behaviors for Systems with Significant Dynamics , 1997, Auton. Robots.

[16]  Andrew Witkin,et al.  Physically Based Modeling: Principles and Practice , 1997 .

[17]  Maja J. Mataric,et al.  Interaction and intelligent behavior , 1994 .

[18]  Shogo Nishida,et al.  Automatic Generation of Moving Crowds in the Virtual Environment , 1998, AMCP.

[19]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Ligand Binding with OBPRM and Haptic User Input: Enhancing Automatic Motion Planning with Virtual Touch , 2000 .

[20]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Shepherding behaviors , 2004, IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, 2004. Proceedings. ICRA '04. 2004.

[21]  Chenyang Lu,et al.  Spatiotemporal query strategies for navigation in dynamic sensor network environments , 2005, 2005 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems.

[22]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Choosing good distance metrics and local planners for probabilistic roadmap methods , 2000, IEEE Trans. Robotics Autom..

[23]  T. Ikegami,et al.  Emergence of collective strategies in a prey-predator game model , 1997 .

[24]  Takashi Ikegami,et al.  Emergence of Collective Strategies in a Prey-Predator Game Model , 1997, Artificial Life.

[25]  Gazihan Alankus,et al.  Automated Motion Synthesis for Virtual Choreography , 2004 .

[26]  Peter Norvig,et al.  Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach , 1995 .

[27]  Craig W. Reynolds Steering Behaviors For Autonomous Characters , 1999 .

[28]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Probabilistic roadmap motion planning for deformable objects , 2002, Proceedings 2002 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.02CH37292).

[29]  Shogo Nishida,et al.  Automatic generation of moving crowd using chaos model , 1997, 1997 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics. Computational Cybernetics and Simulation.

[30]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Customizing PRM roadmaps at query time , 2001, Proceedings 2001 ICRA. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.01CH37164).

[31]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Roadmap-based flocking for complex environments , 2002, 10th Pacific Conference on Computer Graphics and Applications, 2002. Proceedings..

[32]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Solving motion planning problems by iterative relaxation of constraints , 2003 .

[33]  Lydia E. Kavraki,et al.  A two level fuzzy PRM for manipulation planning , 2000, Proceedings. 2000 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS 2000) (Cat. No.00CH37113).

[34]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Enhancing Randomized Motion Planners: Exploring with Haptic Hints , 2001, Auton. Robots.

[35]  Toshio Fukuda,et al.  Group behavior control for MARS (micro autonomous robotic system) , 1999, Proceedings 1999 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (Cat. No.99CH36288C).

[36]  Tucker R. Balch,et al.  Social potentials for scalable multi-robot formations , 2000, Proceedings 2000 ICRA. Millennium Conference. IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation. Symposia Proceedings (Cat. No.00CH37065).

[37]  Nancy M. Amato,et al.  Better Group Behaviors in Complex Environments using Global Roadmaps , 2002 .

[38]  Graham Kendall,et al.  Evolving Collective Behavior in an Artificial Ecology , 2001, Artificial Life.

[39]  Stephen Cameron,et al.  Experiments in automatic flock control , 2000, Robotics Auton. Syst..

[40]  Tsai-Yen Li,et al.  Simulating virtual human crowds with a leader-follower model , 2001, Proceedings Computer Animation 2001. Fourteenth Conference on Computer Animation (Cat. No.01TH8596).