A pedestrian model in human-robot coexisting environment for mobile robot navigation

Personal service robots are rapidly entering our daily lives. It is indispensable to secure safety for the robots and it is an important research topic to avoid collision with persons especially for mobile robots. In this paper, we solve the problem by constructing a pedestrian model considering the existence of robots. In this model, we enhance Helbing's pedestrian model known as Social Force Model (SFM) by using the human-robot mutual estimation model of each other's intention, and we formulate the model in human-robot coexisting environment. By conducting simulation experiments, we show that safe and efficient mobile robot navigation can be done by using the proposed model.