Cooperative multi-robot object transportation system based on hierarchical quadratic programming

Daravuth Koung (1, 2, 3, 4) , Olivier Kermorgant (1, 2, 4) , Isabelle Fantoni (5, 1, 4) , Lamia Belouaer (3)

1 LS2N - Laboratoire des Sciences du Numérique de Nantes
2 ECN - École Centrale de Nantes
3 E-COBOT
4 LS2N - équipe ARMEN - Autonomie des Robots et Maîtrise des interactions avec l’ENvironnement
5 CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique

Formation control gains significant attention in the multi-robot system field as it contributes to a vast range of applications, such as transportation. This paper presents a constrained optimization-based control law for cooperative logistics mission, which consists of rigid shape formation control, group navigation, individual and team obstacle avoidance tasks. These tasks are defined as equality and inequality constraints with different levels of priority. Hierarchical quadratic programming (HQP) approach is used to solve for the optimal solution with an inclusion of velocity limits as inequality constraints to ensure implementation feasibility. Experiment using actual industrial robots is demonstrated in order to validate the theory.

Mots clés: Cooperating Robots; Multi-Robot Systems; Optimization and Optimal Control

Domaines: Robotique [cs.RO]

Daravuth Koung, Olivier Kermorgant, Isabelle Fantoni, Lamia Belouaer. Cooperative multi-robot object transportation system based on hierarchical quadratic programming. IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters, 2021, 6 (4), pp.6466-6472. ⟨10.1109/LRA.2021.3092305⟩. ⟨hal-03289793⟩