Guaranteed strategies to search for mobile evaders in the plane

This paper studies several problems of search in the two-dimensional plane for mobile intruders or evaders. In each case, both the searcher and evaders are assumed to have bounded velocities, with the velocity of the searcher greater than that of the evaders. The searcher has a sensor with a circular footprint which allows it to detect any evaders within the sensor radius. Unlike much of the past work done in search theory, the proposed strategies make no assumptions about the motion of the evaders, and are guaranteed to succeed for any trajectory of the evaders. The three problem formulations studied include the search for mobile targets through a linear corridor, the search for or bounding of mobile targets which start inside of a circular region, and the prevention of mobile targets from entering a circular region. The extension of the proposed strategies for multiple searchers is also discussed