Hybrid planning for challenging construction problems: an answer set programming approach (abstract reprint)

Official URL: https://www.ijcai.org/proceedings/2024/0945.pdf

We study construction problems where multiple robots re- arrange stacks of prefabricated blocks to build stable struc- tures. These problems are challenging due to ramifications of actions, true concurrency, and requirements of supported- ness of blocks by a surface or a robot and stability of the overall structure at all times. We propose a general elabo- ration tolerant method to solve a wide range of construction problems, based on the knowledge representation and reason- ing paradigm of Answer Set Programming. This method not only (i) determines a stable final configuration of the struc- ture, but also (ii) computes the order of manipulation tasks for multiple autonomous robots to build the structure from an initial configuration, (iii) while simultaneously ensuring the requirements of supportedness and stability at all times. We prove the soundness and completeness of our method with respect to these properties. We introduce a set of challeng- ing construction benchmark instances, including construction of (uneven) bridges and overhangs, and discuss the useful- ness of our framework over these instances. Furthermore, we perform experiments to investigate the computational perfor- mance of our hybrid method, and demonstrate the applicabil- ity of our method using a bimanual Baxter robot.