Path planning in uncertain environment by using firefly algorithm

Abstract Autonomous mobile robot navigation is one of the most emerging areas of research by using swarm intelligence. Path planning and obstacle avoidance are most researched current topics like navigational challenges for mobile robot. The paper presents application and implementation of Firefly Algorithm (FA) for Mobile Robot Navigation (MRN) in uncertain environment. The uncertainty is defined over the changing environmental condition from static to dynamic. The attraction of one firefly towards the other firefly due to variation of their brightness is the key concept of the proposed study. The proposed controller efficiently explores the environment and improves the global search in less number of iterations and hence it can be easily implemented for real time obstacle avoidance especially for dynamic environment. It solves the challenges of navigation, minimizes the computational calculations, and avoids random moving of fireflies. The performance of proposed controller is better in terms of path optimality when compared to other intelligent navigational approaches.