scholarly journals Reconnection with the Ideal Tree: A New Approach to Real-Time Search

2014 ◽  
Vol 50 ◽  
pp. 235-264 ◽  
Author(s):  
N. Rivera ◽  
L. Illanes ◽  
J. A. Baier ◽  
C. Hernandez

Many applications, ranging from video games to dynamic robotics, require solving single-agent, deterministic search problems in partially known environments under very tight time constraints. Real-Time Heuristic Search (RTHS) algorithms are specifically designed for those applications. As a subroutine, most of them invoke a standard, but bounded, search algorithm that searches for the goal. In this paper we present FRIT, a simple approach for single-agent deterministic search problems under tight constraints and partially known environments that unlike traditional RTHS does not search for the goal but rather searches for a path that connects the current state with a so-called ideal tree T . When the agent observes that an arc in the tree cannot be traversed in the actual environment, it removes such an arc from T and then carries out a reconnection search whose objective is to find a path between the current state and any node in T . The reconnection search is done using an algorithm that is passed as a parameter to FRIT. If such a parameter is an RTHS algorithm, then the resulting algorithm can be an RTHS algorithm. We show, in addition, that FRIT may be fed with a (bounded) complete blind-search algorithm. We evaluate our approach over grid pathfinding benchmarks including game maps and mazes. Our results show that FRIT, used with RTAA*, a standard RTHS algorithm, outperforms RTAA* significantly; by one order of magnitude under tight time constraints. In addition, FRIT(daRTAA*) substantially outperforms daRTAA*, a state-of-the-art RTHS algorithm, usually obtaining solutions 50% cheaper on average when performing the same search effort. Finally, FRIT(BFS), i.e., FRIT using breadth-first-search, obtains best-quality solutions when time is limited compared to Adaptive A* and Repeated A*. Finally we show that Bug2, a pathfinding-specific navigation algorithm, outperforms FRIT(BFS) when planning time is extremely limited, but when given more time, the situation reverses.

2016 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. 547-571
Author(s):  
Carlos Hernández ◽  
Jorge A. Baier ◽  
Roberto Asín

Time-Bounded A* is a real-time, single-agent, deterministic search algorithm that expands states of a graph in the same order as A* does, but that unlike A* interleaves search and action execution. Known to outperform state-of-the-art real-time search algorithms based on Korf's Learning Real-Time A* (LRTA*) in some benchmarks, it has not been studied in detail and is sometimes not considered as a ``true'' real-time search algorithm since it fails in non-reversible problems even it the goal is still reachable from the current state. In this paper we propose and study Time-Bounded Best-First Search (TB(BFS)) a straightforward generalization of the time-bounded approach to any best-first search algorithm. Furthermore, we propose Restarting Time-Bounded Weighted A* (TB_R(WA*)), an algorithm that deals more adequately with non-reversible search graphs, eliminating ``backtracking moves'' and incorporating search restarts and heuristic learning. In non-reversible problems we prove that TB(BFS) terminates and we deduce cost bounds for the solutions returned by Time-Bounded Weighted A* (TB(WA*)), an instance of TB(BFS). Furthermore, we prove TB_R(WA*), under reasonable conditions, terminates. We evaluate TB(WA) in both grid pathfinding and the 15-puzzle. In addition, we evaluate TB_R(WA*) on the racetrack problem. We compare our algorithms to LSS-LRTWA*, a variant of LRTA* that can exploit lookahead search and a weighted heuristic. A general observation is that the performance of both TB(WA*) and TB_R(WA*) improves as the weight parameter is increased. In addition, our time-bounded algorithms almost always outperform LSS-LRTWA* by a significant margin.


Author(s):  
Carlos Hernandez ◽  
Adi Botea ◽  
Jorge A. Baier ◽  
Vadim Bulitko

Real-time search algorithms are relevant to time-sensitive decision-making domains such as video games and robotics. In such settings, the agent is required to decide on each action under a constant time bound, regardless of the search space size. Despite recent progress, poor-quality solutions can be produced mainly due to state re-visitation. Different techniques have been developed to reduce such a re-visitation with state pruning showing promise. In this paper, we propose a novel pruning approach applicable to the wide class of real-time search algorithms. Given a local search space of arbitrary size, our technique aggressively prunes away all states in its interior, possibly adding new edges to maintain the connectivity of the search space frontier. An experimental evaluation shows that our pruning often improves the performance of a base real-time search algorithm by over an order of magnitude. This allows our implemented system to outperform state-of-the-art real-time search algorithms used in the evaluation.


2012 ◽  
Vol 43 ◽  
pp. 523-570 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Hernandez ◽  
J. A. Baier

Heuristics used for solving hard real-time search problems have regions with depressions. Such regions are bounded areas of the search space in which the heuristic function is inaccurate compared to the actual cost to reach a solution. Early real-time search algorithms, like LRTA*, easily become trapped in those regions since the heuristic values of their states may need to be updated multiple times, which results in costly solutions. State-of-the-art real-time search algorithms, like LSS-LRTA* or LRTA*(k), improve LRTA*'s mechanism to update the heuristic, resulting in improved performance. Those algorithms, however, do not guide search towards avoiding depressed regions. This paper presents depression avoidance, a simple real-time search principle to guide search towards avoiding states that have been marked as part of a heuristic depression. We propose two ways in which depression avoidance can be implemented: mark-and-avoid and move-to-border. We implement these strategies on top of LSS-LRTA* and RTAA*, producing 4 new real-time heuristic search algorithms: aLSS-LRTA*, daLSS-LRTA*, aRTAA*, and daRTAA*. When the objective is to find a single solution by running the real-time search algorithm once, we show that daLSS-LRTA* and daRTAA* outperform their predecessors sometimes by one order of magnitude. Of the four new algorithms, daRTAA* produces the best solutions given a fixed deadline on the average time allowed per planning episode. We prove all our algorithms have good theoretical properties: in finite search spaces, they find a solution if one exists, and converge to an optimal after a number of trials.


2013 ◽  
Vol 48 ◽  
pp. 717-732 ◽  
Author(s):  
J.L. Pérez de la Cruz ◽  
L. Mandow ◽  
E. Machuca

This article considers the performance of the MOA* multiobjective search algorithm with heuristic information. It is shown that in certain cases blind search can be more efficient than perfectly informed search, in terms of both node and label expansions. A class of simple graph search problems is defined for which the number of nodes grows linearly with problem size and the number of nondominated labels grows quadratically. It is proved that for these problems the number of node expansions performed by blind MOA* grows linearly with problem size, while the number of such expansions performed with a perfectly informed heuristic grows quadratically. It is also proved that the number of label expansions grows quadratically in the blind case and cubically in the informed case.


Electronics ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 13
Author(s):  
Balaji M ◽  
Chandrasekaran M ◽  
Vaithiyanathan Dhandapani

A Novel Rail-Network Hardware with simulation facilities is presented in this paper. The hardware is designed to facilitate the learning of application-oriented, logical, real-time programming in an embedded system environment. The platform enables the creation of multiple unique programming scenarios with variability in complexity without any hardware changes. Prior experimental hardware comes with static programming facilities that focus the students’ learning on hardware features and programming basics, leaving them ill-equipped to take up practical applications with more real-time constraints. This hardware complements and completes their learning to help them program real-world embedded systems. The hardware uses LEDs to simulate the movement of trains in a network. The network has train stations, intersections and parking slots where the train movements can be controlled by using a 16-bit Renesas RL78/G13 microcontroller. Additionally, simulating facilities are provided to enable the students to navigate the trains by manual controls using switches and indicators. This helps them get an easy understanding of train navigation functions before taking up programming. The students start with simple tasks and gradually progress to more complicated ones with real-time constraints, on their own. During training, students’ learning outcomes are evaluated by obtaining their feedback and conducting a test at the end to measure their knowledge acquisition during the training. Students’ Knowledge Enhancement Index is originated to measure the knowledge acquired by the students. It is observed that 87% of students have successfully enhanced their knowledge undergoing training with this rail-network simulator.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sherif M. Hanafy ◽  
Hussein Hoteit ◽  
Jing Li ◽  
Gerard T. Schuster

AbstractResults are presented for real-time seismic imaging of subsurface fluid flow by parsimonious refraction and surface-wave interferometry. Each subsurface velocity image inverted from time-lapse seismic data only requires several minutes of recording time, which is less than the time-scale of the fluid-induced changes in the rock properties. In this sense this is real-time imaging. The images are P-velocity tomograms inverted from the first-arrival times and the S-velocity tomograms inverted from dispersion curves. Compared to conventional seismic imaging, parsimonious interferometry reduces the recording time and increases the temporal resolution of time-lapse seismic images by more than an order-of-magnitude. In our seismic experiment, we recorded 90 sparse data sets over 4.5 h while injecting 12-tons of water into a sand dune. Results show that the percolation of water is mostly along layered boundaries down to a depth of a few meters, which is consistent with our 3D computational fluid flow simulations and laboratory experiments. The significance of parsimonious interferometry is that it provides more than an order-of-magnitude increase of temporal resolution in time-lapse seismic imaging. We believe that real-time seismic imaging will have important applications for non-destructive characterization in environmental, biomedical, and subsurface imaging.


2011 ◽  
Vol 142 ◽  
pp. 12-15
Author(s):  
Ping Feng

The paper puts forward the dynamic path planning algorithm based on improving chaos genetic algorithm by using genetic algorithms and chaos search algorithm. In the practice of navigation, the algorithm can compute at the best path to meet the needs of the navigation in such a short period of planning time. Furthermore,this algorithm can replan a optimum path of the rest paths after the traffic condition in the sudden.


2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 143-156
Author(s):  
Jean-François Biasse ◽  
Benjamin Pring

AbstractIn this paper we provide a framework for applying classical search and preprocessing to quantum oracles for use with Grover’s quantum search algorithm in order to lower the quantum circuit-complexity of Grover’s algorithm for single-target search problems. This has the effect (for certain problems) of reducing a portion of the polynomial overhead contributed by the implementation cost of quantum oracles and can be used to provide either strict improvements or advantageous trade-offs in circuit-complexity. Our results indicate that it is possible for quantum oracles for certain single-target preimage search problems to reduce the quantum circuit-size from $O\left(2^{n/2}\cdot mC\right)$ (where C originates from the cost of implementing the quantum oracle) to $O(2^{n/2} \cdot m\sqrt{C})$ without the use of quantum ram, whilst also slightly reducing the number of required qubits.This framework captures a previous optimisation of Grover’s algorithm using preprocessing [21] applied to cryptanalysis, providing new asymptotic analysis. We additionally provide insights and asymptotic improvements on recent cryptanalysis [16] of SIKE [14] via Grover’s algorithm, demonstrating that the speedup applies to this attack and impacting upon quantum security estimates [16] incorporated into the SIKE specification [14].


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