Optimal Velocity Planning of Wheeled Mobile Robots on Specific Paths in Static and Dynamic Environments

This paper deals with optimal temporal‐planning of wheeled mobile robots (WMRs) when navigating on predefined spatial paths. A method is proposed to generate a time‐optimal velocity profile for any spatial path in static environments or when mobile obstacles are present. The method generates a feasible trajectory to be tracked by fully exploiting velocity, acceleration and deceleration boundaries of the WMR, and by ensuring the continuity of the velocity and acceleration functions. As an additional benefit for the tracking process the jerk is also bounded. The algorithm is not time consuming, since it mostly uses closed mathematical expressions, nonetheless iteration strategies are presented to solve specific situations. However, such situations are not expected to occur when the spatial paths are planned as smooth curves. The success of the algorithm was tested by experimental and simulation results on the WMR “RAM.” © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.