Sensor-based path-planning of multiple mobile robots to overcome large transmission delays in teleoperation

We describe the robustness of our sensor-based path-planning algorithm of multiple mobile robots in teleoperation with large transmission delays between operation and remote sites. First of all, we propose a teleoperation system with shared autonomy. All the mobile robots at a remote site have a common set of sensor-based traffic rules, and therefore they avoid each other and arrive at their destinations autonomously. Then, a human at an operation site directs a robot. In an extended version of our sensor-based path-planning algorithm, if an operated robot comes close to some of the other robots, whose distance equals to or is smaller than a threshold D, the operated robot automatically stops and some robots autonomously avoid the operated robot. This is a kind of fail-safe function at a remote site. After the interference, the other robots asymptotically arrive at their destinations by the distributed sensor-based path-planning algorithm, and also the operated robot is directly conducted to the destination by a human being. This is a kind of autonomy at a remote site. Finally, the usefulness of fail-safe operation and autonomy is ascertained in a few simulation results