A Comprehensive Review of Path Planning Techniques for Mobile Robot
Navigation in Known and Unknown Environments
Abstract
The increasing use of mobile robots in everyday life has ne- cessitated
the development of efficient path planning algo- rithms to enable safe
and reliable navigation in both known and unknown environments. Path
planning is the process of discovering an optimal and safe path for a
robot to navigate from its starting point to its destination. Finding
the ideal collision-free path is one of the most challenging aspects of
mobile robot navigation. There are various path-planning techniques to
obtain an optimal path in the presence of ob- stacles; an optimal path
planning technique of mobile robot saves time and reduces capital
investment. These techniques can be divided into two categories viz
clas- sical and heuristic. This paper provides a comprehensive re- view
of path planning techniques for mobile robot naviga- tion in known and
unknown environments. Path planning becomes more challenging in unknown
environments, where a robot does not have prior knowledge about the
surround- ings. In contrast, path planning in known environments can
utilize prior knowledge about the environment to find an op- timal path.
When comparing classical and heuristic approaches, it has been found
that heuristic approaches are more resilient and perform well in all
environments because they can deal with uncertainties. Heuristic
approaches are also employed as hybrid algorithms to increase the
performance of the clas- sical approaches. Heuristic techniques are
well-known and frequently used for mobile robot path planning. Key opti-
mization criteria, including path length, smoothness and safety degree,
are also critically assessed. The paper also tabulates the advantages,
disadvantages, and comparison of classical and heuristic path-planning
techniques. The paper finally concludes by discussing potential future
research directions to provide a roadmap for future advancements in
mobile robot path planning techniques