Planning Non-Entangling Paths for Tethered Underwater Robots Using Simulated Annealing

In this paper we present a simulated annealingbased method for planning efficient paths with a tether which avoid entanglement in an obstacle-filled environment. By evaluating total path cost as a function of both path length and entanglements, a robot can plan a path through multiple points of interest while avoiding becoming entangled in any obstacle. In simulated trials, the robot was able to successfully plan non-entangling paths in an obstacle-filled environment. These results were then validated in pool trials on a SeaBotix vLVB300 underwater vehicle.