Coordination of multiple mobile robots with limited communication range in pursuit of single mobile target in cluttered environment

This paper addresses the problem of coordinating multiple mobile robots in searching for and capturing a mobile target, with the aim of reducing the capture time. Compared with the previous algorithms, we assume that the target can be detected by any robot and captured successfully by two or more robots. In this paper, we assume that each robot has a limited communication range. We maintain the robots within a mobile network to guarantee the successful capture. In addition, the motion of the target is modeled and incorporated into directing the motion of the robots to reduce the capture time. A coordination algorithm considering both aspects is proposed. This algorithm can greatly reduce the expected time of capturing the mobile target. Finally, we validate the algorithm by the simulations and experiments.