AI-CART: an algorithm to incrementally calculate artificial potential fields in real-time

Potential fields have been widely used for mobile robot navigation and obstacle avoidance. Their success is due to two main reasons: the simplicity with which a path planning problem can be represented and solved and, most of all, the computational efficiency that allows its real-time applicability. In this paper we analyze the complexity of calculating the artificial potential field and propose a novel algorithm that statistically reduces it.