On mission-dependent coordination of multiple vehicles under spatial and temporal constraints

Coordinating multiple autonomous ground vehicles is paramount to many industrial applications. Vehicle trajectories must take into account temporal and spatial requirements, e.g., usage of floor space and deadlines on task execution. In this paper we present an approach to obtain sets of alternative execution patterns (called trajectory envelopes) which satisfy these requirements and are conflict-free. The approach consists of multiple constraint solvers which progressively refine trajectory envelopes according to mission requirements. The approach leverages the notion of least commitment to obtain easily revisable trajectories for execution.