Cooperative robotic teams for supervision and management of large logistic spaces: Methodology and applications

Robots and automated systems can be employed in the logistic field to efficiently perform common tasks like building and updating maps of indoor and outdoor logistic spaces, locating specific goods on the map, tracing the product flow in the area, while assuring the surveillance of the environment. This paper reports and discusses the already achieved results of the on-going research project MACP4Log (Mobile Autonomous and Cooperating robotic Platforms for supervision and monitoring of large LOGistic surfaces), aimed at the study and development of a prototype of a mobile robotic platform, with on-board vision systems and sensors, integrating a flexible wireless communication solution, able to move autonomously in large logistic spaces, and to communicate with a supervisor and other similar platforms in order to achieve a coordinated action to carry out specific tasks.