Distributed Algorithm with Emergent Area Partitioning and Base Station’s Situation Awareness for Multi-Robot Patrolling
Kazuho Kobayashi, Shohei Kobayashi, Seiya Ueno, T. Higuchi · Journal of Robotics and Mechatronics · 2025
Patrolling with multiple robots enables efficient surveillance for detecting and managing undesirable situations. This necessitates improved patrol efficiency and operator situational awareness at base stations. An enhanced situational awareness enables operators to predict robot behavior, support recognition and decision-making, and execute emergency interventions. This paper presents the local reactive and partition (LR-PT) algorithm. It is a novel multi-robot patrolling approach. In the simulations, LR-PT outperformed the existing methods by ensuring frequent patrols of all the locations of interest and enhancing the situational awareness of the base station. The robots independently select patrol targets based on locally available information. It integrates patrol requirements and the urgency of reporting mission progress to base stations into a unified utility function. This locality also contributes to the robustness against communication constraints and robot failures, as demonstrated in this study. The algorithm further autonomously performs emergent area partitioning. This can prevent falling into local optima and realize a comprehensive patrol over the entire mission area. The simulation results demonstrate the superior performance of LR-PT for multi-robot patrolling. It utilizes the advantages of swarm robotics and addresses real-world operational challenges.