Path deformation method in robot motion planning problems in the presence of obstacles

Path planning problem arises in many practically important fields for different robots, including wheeled and space ones. The following motion planning problem for a robot is considered. Suppose that there is a precomputed collision-free path, but, in the course of time, there may appear new obstacles (or old ones may change their positions) that prevent motion. It is required to deform the path to make it collision-free. To solve the above problem, a new method is proposed. The method is based on a component-wise method for improving path curvature and on the potential field method. The proposed method not only allows the path to avoid obstacles but also makes it smoother both in the 2D and 3D cases.