Exploration of Large Outdoor Environments Using Multi-Criteria Decision Making

Abstract

We present a Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) framework specifically designed for planetary exploration. Our work is based on PROMETHEE II, which allows operators to add task-specific criteria and conditions. We extended this algorithm to improve its resource usage by reducing the number of candidate exploration goals that have to be evaluated and compared. This is crucial when given a large number of goals, as is typical for outdoor environments. In addition, we identified five different criteria for planetary exploration, including a novel criterion that we call Direction of Interest (DOI), and use a categorization of these for further resource optimizations. We thereby ensure that the CPU usage of our decision making method can meet the limited budget of a space rover. We present simulated and real-world experiments with the Lightweight Rover Unit (LRU) and show a reduction of the processing time for decision making of approx. 70%..