Many-Robot MCM Search Systems

A system comprising a large number of identical and very inexpensive robotic search vehicles may serve as an effective tool in a variety of MCM operations, providing improved mine detection and clearance capabilities while reducing cost and the physical risk to MCM personnel. Moreover, the many-robot approach to addressing MCM applications becomes increasingly viable as continuing technological developments provide needed mine detection and other subsystem capabilities at ever decreasing cost. Real challenges remain, however, at the system design level, and the most effective and cost-effective systems will result from careful attention to actual system requirements. Following a discussion of detection sensor models, a simple analytical framework is employed to demonstrate that the design of a cost-effective many-robot search system can depend sensitively on the interplay of sensor cost and performance levels with mission-specific functional and performance requirements. The issue of how to achieve effectively randomized search strategies that provide uniform search coverage over a specified area is then treated. Finally, the importance of using detailed detection statistics to estimate the independence of successive sensor sweeps and to generate an adequate model of sensor performance is discussed.