Geometric Motion Planning and Formation Optimization for a Fleet of Nonholonomic Mobile Robots

In this paper, we present a geometric method for motion planning for a fleet of differentially driven mobile robots moving in formation, that explicitly takes in to account their nonholonomic constraints. The relative position of each mobile robot within the formation induces different motion plans for the individual mobile robots. By using a suitable metric, defined on the motions of each mobile robot, we can evaluate the performance of such induced motion plans. These performance metrics in cumulative form or individual form are used to optimize the overall formation (i.e. their relative positions) for performing a given task. The approach is well suited for online implementation and is demonstrated using case studies. Keywordsteam-based multi-agent motion planning, performance evaluation, formation optimization.