Two-Dimensional Target Following Using Discrete Waypoints via Artificial Vector Field

This paper investigates the guidance issue of the two-dimensional target following of a general robot with only discrete waypoints information of the target. In particular, a velocity guidance strategy is proposed by introducing an artificial vector field. First, thin plate spline interpolation is employed to fit the waypoints into a continuous curve in real time. Due to the spatial relationship between the robot and the target, a guiding vector field and an additional vector field are proposed separately to ensure the convergence of the robot onto the target curve. Finally, the velocity signal is obtained by combining the two vector fields to an artificial vector field. Simulation results show that the proposed strategy achieves target following with an ultimate bound.