Harmonic potential field path planning for high speed vehicles

This paper presents a method to represent complex shaped obstacles in harmonic potential fields used for vehicle path planning. The proposed method involves calculating the potential field for a series of circular obstacles inserted into the unobstructed potential field. The potential field for the total obstacle is a weighted average of the circular obstacle potential fields. This method explicitly calculates a stream function for the potential field. The need for the stream function is explained for situations involving controlling a dynamic system such as a high speed ground vehicle. The traditional potential field controller is also augmented to take the stream function into account. Simulation results are presented to show the effectiveness of the potential field generation technique and the augmented vehicle controller.