Tele-coordinated control of multi-robot systems via the Internet

The coordination of multi-robots is required in many scenarios for efficiency and task completion. Combined with teleoperation capabilities, coordinating robots provide a powerful tool. Add to this the Internet and now it is possible for multi-experts at multi-remote sites to control multi-robots in a coordinated fashion. For this to be feasible there are several hurdles to be crossed including Internet type delays, uncertainties in the environment and uncertainties in the object manipulated. In addition, there is a need to measure and control the quality of tele-coordination. This paper proposes a measure for the quality of tele-coordination, referred to as the coordination index, and details the design procedure that ensures a system performs at a required index. The theory developed was tested by bilaterally tele-coordinating two mobile manipulators via the Internet. The experimental results confirmed the theory presented.