New potential functions with random force algorithms using potential field method

Autonomous mobile robot path planning is a common topic for robotics and computational geometry. Many important results have been found, but a lot of issues are still veiled. This paper first describes new problem of symmetrically aligned robot-obstacle-goal (SAROG) when using potential field methods for mobile robot path planning. In addition, we consider constant robot speed for practical use. The SAROG and the constant speed involve two potential risks: robot-obstacle collision and local minima trap. For dealing with the two potential risks, we analyze the conditions of the collision and the local minima trap, and propose new potential functions and random force based algorithms. For the algorithm verification, we use WiRobot X80 with three ultrasonic range sensor modules.