A reduced-order analytical solution to mobile robot trajectory generation in the presence of moving obstacles

This paper addresses the problem of determining a collision-free path for a mobile robot moving in a dynamically changing environment. By explicitly considering kinematic model of the robot, the family of feasible trajectories and their corresponding steering controls are derived in a closed form. Then, a new collision avoidance condition is developed for the dynamically changing environment, it consists of a time criterion and a geometrical criterion, and it has explicit physical meanings in both the transformed space and the original working space. By imposing the avoidance condition, one can determine the corresponding steering angle for collision avoidance in a closed form. Such a path meets all boundary conditions, is continuous, and can be updated in real tune once a change in the environment is detected. Simulations show that the proposed method is effective.