All terrain vehicle path planning based on D* lite and MPC based planning paradigm in discrete space

This paper presents a multi stage technique for dealing with path planning problem on poorly traversable and partially unknown rough terrains. Traditionally, this problem is solved using D*-like algorithms, but by including a vehicle model, along with its constraints and the dynamics of the environment, this problem becomes very challenging. Another problem that requires a close attention is that the data measurements of the environment are usually discrete in nature, while current frameworks deal with mostly continuous data and systems. We propose solution based on fast D* lite algorithm for global path cost-to-go computation while employing MPC planning paradigm for solving constrained optimal control problem for the purpose of local planning. With this paradigm in use, both global, stationary, state of the environment, and local dynamics of the environment are taken into account in the near-optimal path planning.