Online dead-lock avoidance scheme of wheeled mobile robot under the presence of boxlike obstacles

This paper presents a path planner for the design of autonomous vehicles such as mobile robots. The path planner is based on the potential field method. Through the Hough transformation the obstacle detection is accomplished by laser scanner which returns a two dimensional profile of the horizontal region in front of the robot. The local minima problem has been solved by redefining the repulsive potential field. Also the system controller (look-ahead control) gives the robot the capability of controlling the distance between the reference point and the center of the robot. As a result, the potential field method performs effectively under our system and allows the mobile robot to follow a smooth trajectory in a flexible manner for attaining the desired goal autonomously whether in a static or dynamic environment