We present a method for robot path planning in the robot’s configuration space, in the presence of fixed obstacles. Our method employs both combinatorial and gradient-based optimization techniques, but most distinguishably, it employs a Multi-sphere Scheme purposefully developed for two and three-dimensional packing problems. This is a singular feature which not only enables us to use a particu...

This paper discusses techniques for performing eecient decision-theoretic planning. We give an overview of the drips decision-theoretic reenement planning system, which uses abstraction to eeciently identify optimal plans. We present techniques for automatically generating search control information , which can signiicantly improve the planner's performance. We evaluate the ee-ciency of drips b...

We present concepts for pre-operative planning of brain tumor resections. The proposed system uses a combination of traditional and novel visualization techniques rendered in real-time on modern GPUs in order to support neurosurgeons during intervention planning. A set of multimodal 2D and 3D renderings conveys the relation between the lesion and the various structures at risk and also depicts ...

Practitioners have long stressed the need to teach professional commumcations skills to planning students. This paper describes ten years of experience in teaching a course in which communications skills and techniques of gathering and analyzing information are taught concurrently while investigating a problem of importance in the community. The course involves an ongoing collaboration, a "marr...

Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI) agents are well suited for autonomous applications in dynamic environments. Their precompiled plan schemata contain the procedural knowledge of an agent and contribute to the performance. The agents generally are constrained to a fixed set of action patterns. Their choice depends on current goals, not on the future of the environment. Planning techniques can provid...

Foreword These notes are based on the AI planning lectures at the Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg. I would like to thank all the students who have participated in the planning course and given comments, pointed out errors, and suggested other improvements, including Slawomir Grzonka,

We present here an overview of several planning techniques in robotics. We will not be concerned with the synthesis of abstract mission and task plans, using well known classical and other domain-independent planning techniques. We will mainly focus on to how refine such abstract plans into robust sensory-motor actions and on some planning techniques that can be useful for that. The paper intro...

We describe an approach to text planning that uses the XSLT template-processing engine to create logical forms for an external surface realizer. Using a realizer that can process logical forms with embedded alternatives provides a substitute for backtracking in the text-planning process. This allows the text planner to combine the strengths of the AI-planning and template-based traditions in na...