Optimal point-to-point motion planning of non-holonomic mobile robots in the presence of multiple obstacles

This paper presents theoretical and experimental investigations in dynamic modeling and optimal path planning of a non-holonomic mobile robot in cluttered environments. A mobile robot in the presence of multiple obstacles was considered. Nonlinear dynamic model of the system was derived with respect to non-holonomic constraints of robot’s platform. Motion planning of the system was formulated as an optimal control problem, and efficient potential functions were employed for collision avoidance. Applying the Pontryagin’s minimum principle was resulted in a two-point boundary value problem solved numerically. The effectiveness and capability of the proposed method were demonstrated through simulation studies. Finally, for verifying the feasibility of the presented method, results obtained for the Scout mobile robot were compared with the experiments.