Path Planning Algorithms and Their Use in Robotic Navigation Systems

This paper serves as an introduction to the concept of path planning and navigation. Contents include path planning algorithms and their many applications. Specific applications include navigation systems in autonomous/semi-autonomous systems. Often these autonomous systems rely on several layers of sensor data, however at the root is a search-algorithm-based navigation system. This paper is to serve as an introduction to these algorithms and the use cases where young/new roboticists can develop path finding/path planning applications to fit their educational robotics needs. The A*, (A-Star), search algorithm and its applications will be the primary algorithm used within this paper. This paper is a portion of an ongoing research project for a robotic vehicle navigation system.