Avoidance of High-Speed Obstacles Based on Velocity Obstacles

Abstract

For obstacles moving with high speeds, existing motion planning methods can rarely guarantee collision avoidance. This paper proposes a viable two-period velocity obstacle algorithm where one period predicts potential collisions within a limited time horizon, and the second period foresees collisions beyond that horizon. The second period is activated only when the obstacle's moving speed is larger than the maximum speed of the robot. The applicability of the new algorithm and the related computation issues are discussed. Both computer simulations and laboratory experiments illustrated the effectiveness of the proposed obstacle avoidance algorithm.