Planning in Dynamic Environments: Extending HTNs with Nonlinear Continuous Effects

Abstract

Planning in dynamic continuous environments requires reasoning about nonlinear continuous effects, which previous Hierarchical Task Network (HTN) planners do not support. In this paper, we extend an existing HTN planner with a new state projection algorithm. To our knowledge, this is the first HTN planner that can reason about nonlinear continuous effects. We use a wait action to instruct this planner to consider continuous effects in a given state. We also introduce a new planning domain to demonstrate the benefits of planning with nonlinear continuous effects. We compare our approach with a linear continuous effects planner and a discrete effects HTN planner on a benchmark domain, which reveals that its additional costs are largely mitigated by domain knowledge. Finally, we present an initial application of this algorithm in a practical domain, a Navy training simulation, illustrating the utility of this approach for planning in dynamic continuous environments.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jan 01, 2010
Accession Number
ADA553192

Entities

People

  • David W. Aha
  • Matt Molineaux
  • Matthew Klenk

Organizations

  • Knexus Research (United States)

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Materials and Manufacturing Processes

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Algebraic Functions
  • Algorithms
  • Antisubmarine Warfare
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Case Studies
  • Demographic Cohorts
  • Differential Equations
  • Environment
  • Intelligent Agents
  • Military Research
  • Navy
  • Reasoning
  • Ships
  • Simulations
  • Simulators
  • Submarine Warfare
  • Training

Readers

  • Neural Network Machine Learning.
  • Systems Analysis and Design