Navigation of Unmanned Marine Vehicles in Accordance with the Rules of the Road

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the in-field autonomous operation of unmanned marine vehicles in accordance with convention for safe and proper collision avoidance as prescribed by the Coast Guard Collision Regulations (COLREGS). These rules are written to train and guide safe human operation of marine vehicles and are heavily dependent on human common sense in determining rule applicability as well as rule execution especially when multiple rules apply simultaneously. To capture the flexibility exploited by humans, this work applies a novel method of multi-objective optimization, interval programming in a behavior-based control framework for representing the navigation rules, as well as task behaviors, in a way that achieves simultaneous optimal satisfaction. We present experimental validation of this approach using multiple autonomous surface craft. This work represents the first in-field demonstration of multiobjective optimization applied to autonomous COLREGS-based marine vehicle navigation.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
May 01, 2006
Accession Number
ADA572909

Entities

People

  • John J. Leonard
  • Joseph Curcio
  • Michael Benjamin

Organizations

  • Naval Sea Systems Command

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Autonomy
  • Ground and Sea Platforms

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Algorithms
  • Autonomous Navigation
  • Autonomous Underwater Vehicles
  • Collision Avoidance
  • Collisions
  • Computer Programming
  • Control Systems
  • Engineering
  • Intervals
  • Law
  • Mechanical Engineering
  • Motion Planning
  • Multiobjective Optimization
  • Navigation
  • Optimization
  • Robots
  • Wireless Communications

Readers

  • Adaptive Control and Estimation with Uncertainty in Dynamic Systems.
  • Maritime Security/Maritime Homeland Security
  • Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) Autonomous Capabilities and Mission Reconnaissance.

Technology Areas

  • Autonomy
  • Autonomy - Autonomous System Control