Exploration Algorithm Technique for Multi-Robot Collaboration

This paper focuses on wall-following exploration algorithm using two cooperating mobile robots. The aim is to decrease the exploration time and energy consumption. The new technique is a combination of wall-following exploration algorithm and frontier-based exploration algorithm. The proposed algorithm is divided into two stages: Firstly, one of the robots follows (detects) the entire of the environment walls. And secondly, they employ frontier-based algorithm to complete exploring the remaining unexplored areas in the environment. During these two stages, the robots sweep the line-of-sight between them in each step to maximize the exploration efficiency. Numbers of simulation experiments are presented. Moreover, testing with real robots will be introduced. In these experiments, the negatives and shortcomings of this exploration algorithm will be overcome.