Concrete multi-agent path planning enabling kinodynamically aggressive maneuvers

Coordinated trajectory planning is essential for multi-robot applications, ranging from factory automation to entertainment. The main challenge is providing long-term coordination guarantees, such as freedom from collisions, deadlocks, and livelocks, as well as kinodynamic agility, especially in densely populated environments. Although continuous optimization provides agility, it is computationally expensive. In contrast, discrete search is scalable but lacks physical realism for robot execution. This study introduces concrete planning, a hybrid approach that captures real-world continuous dynamics while maintaining scalable guaranteed planning via discrete search. We integrate recent advances in robot dynamics learning, optimal control, and anytime complete planning into a modular framework. The framework is deployed with 40 robots, including 20 aerial, 8 ground, and 12 obstacle robots, operating in a compact laboratory space. Despite the dense and time-varying setup, the robots achieve consecutive navigation missions on-demand, while executing aggressive maneuvers that substantially reduce task completion time.

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Publication Details

Journal
npj Robotics
Published
2026-03-14
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s44182-026-00083-2
Primary Topic
Robotic Path Planning Algorithms
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Concrete multi-agent path planning enabling kinodynamically aggressive maneuvers

Keisuke Okumura, Amanda Prorok, Heedo Woo, Zhan Gao et al.
npj Robotics
Robotic Path Planning Algorithms
article

Concrete multi-agent path planning enabling kinodynamically aggressive maneuvers

Keisuke Okumura, Amanda Prorok, Heedo Woo, Zhan Gao, Guang Yang
article en

Abstract

Coordinated trajectory planning is essential for multi-robot applications, ranging from factory automation to entertainment. The main challenge is providing long-term coordination guarantees, such as freedom from collisions, deadlocks, and livelocks, as well as kinodynamic agility, especially in densely populated environments. Although continuous optimization provides agility, it is computationally expensive. In contrast, discrete search is scalable but lacks physical realism for robot execution. This study introduces concrete planning, a hybrid approach that captures real-world continuous dynamics while maintaining scalable guaranteed planning via discrete search. We integrate recent advances in robot dynamics learning, optimal control, and anytime complete planning into a modular framework. The framework is deployed with 40 robots, including 20 aerial, 8 ground, and 12 obstacle robots, operating in a compact laboratory space. Despite the dense and time-varying setup, the robots achieve consecutive navigation missions on-demand, while executing aggressive maneuvers that substantially reduce task completion time.

npj RoboticsVol. 4(1)
University of Cambridge (GB), National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (JP)
Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, ACT-X
Sustainable cities and communities
Openalex Percentile: Top 22%
Robotic Path Planning Algorithms
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