Formalizing and Solving Information Collection Problems with Autonomous Sensor Systems

This paper addresses the problem of planning data collection missions for a set of Information Collection Systems (ICS) to respond to a set of information requests. This problem goes from the formalization of information needs to the optimization of ICS actions. After having formalized requests and decomposed them into elementary requests, the problem can be modeled with a graph characterizing the various aspects: coordination and assignment of ICSs, request satisfaction and ICS use optimization. Based on this graph, the problem can be solved with an A*-like search algorithm.