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Abstract : |
In unstructured, unknown, and dynamic environments, planning systems cannot generate a plan a priori that can be expected to perform reasonably in the face of such uncertainty, nor can they anticipate all contingencies that may arise; instead, decision-making must be based on current information and state at all times, proceeding in a data-driven manner, rather than attempting to impose unrealizable plans in a top-down fashion. In addition, the dynamics of the vehicle itself often play an important role in determining which actions may be achieved and which actions are to be avoided. In addition, for domains such as mobile robot navigation, there is the need to combine information from several different sources to be used to perform diverse tasks. A system architecture should be able to accommodate and integrate subsystems that have been developed independently, so it must impose minimal restrictions on the nature of the data, representations, and algorithms used by these subsystems designed to achieve their respective tasks. Also, sensors and the functions that process their data each operate at different rates, so they must be allowed to operate asynchronously to maximize the throughput and thus the responsiveness of the system. The Distributed Architecture for Mobile Navigation, or DAMN, is implemented as a group of distributed, |
