Distributed pursuit-evasion with limited-visibility sensors via frontier-based exploration

This paper addresses a novel visibility-based pursuit-evasion problem in which a team of searchers with limited range sensors must coordinate to clear any evaders from an unknown planar environment. We present a distributed algorithm built around guaranteeing complete coverage of the frontier between cleared and contaminated areas while expanding the cleared area. Our frontier-based algorithm can guarantee detection of evaders in unknown, multiply-connected planar environments which may be non-polygonal. We also detail a method for storing and updating the global frontier between cleared and contaminated areas without building a global map or requiring global localization, which enables our algorithm to be truly distributed. We demonstrate the functionality of the algorithm through Player/Stage simulations.