Development of analytical algorithms for the sensor coverage problem

Abstract

The sensor coverage problem requires a group of mobile sensors to autonomously determine trajectories such that the sensors enclose a region of interest. It has many applications such as tracking oil spills underwater, volcanic ash plumes in the air, and so on. This thesis develops analytical control laws so as to distribute autonomous mobile sensors on a plane in a manner so as to ensure that an entire region of interest is covered by at least one sensor. Two scenarios are considered. In the first scenario the shapes of the sensing zones for each sensor are assumed to be circular, and dynamic inversion is used to develop control laws that autonomously position three sensors in such a manner that there is no gap in coverage between them. In the second scenario the shapes of the sensing zones are assumed to be arbitrary (convex or non-convex), and a collision cone approach is combined with dynamic inversion techniques to determine trajectories for the three sensors in such a way that the coverage zones of each sensor touch. Simulations are performed to demonstrate the performance of the designed control laws.