A simulation framework for evaluating mobile robots

As robotic technologies mature, we are moving from simple systems that roam our laboratories to heteroge-neous groups of systems that operate in complex non-structured environments. The novel and extremely com-plex nature of these autonomous systems generates a great deal of subsystem interdependencies that makes team, in-dividual system, and subsystem validation and perfor-mance measurement difficult. Simple simulations or labo-ratory experimentation are no longer sufficient. To assist in evaluating these components and making design deci-sions, we are developing an integrated real-virtual envi-ronment. It is our hope that this will greatly facilitate the design, development, and understanding of how to con-figure and use multi-robot teams and will accelerate the robots ’ deployment. Keywords: simulation, architectures, 4D/RCS, mobile robots, algo