Boundary-RRT Algorithm for Drone Collision Avoidance and Interleaved Path Re-planning

Various modified algorithms of rapidly-exploring random tree (RRT) have been previously proposed. However, compared to the RRT algorithm for collision avoidance with global and static obstacles, it is not easy to find a collision avoidance and local path re-planning algorithm for dynamic obstacles based on the RRT algorithm. In this study, we propose boundary-RRT*, a novel-algorithm that can be applied to aerial vehicles for collision avoidance and path re-planning in a three-dimensional environment. The algorithm not only bounds the configuration space, but it also includes an implicit bias for the bounded configuration space. Therefore, it can create a path with a natural curvature without defining a bias function. Furthermore, the exploring space is reduced to a half-torus by combining it with simple right-of-way rules. When defining the distance as a cost, the proposed algorithm through numerical analysis shows that the standard deviation (σ) approaches 0 as the number of samples per unit time increases and the length of epsilon ε (maximum length of an edge in the tree) decreases. This means that a stable waypoint list can be generated using the proposed algorithm. Therefore, by increasing real-time performance through simple calculation and the boundary of the configuration space, the algorithm proved to be suitable for collision avoidance of aerial vehicles and replanning of local paths.