Optimal Positioning for Mobile Platform/Manipulator Systems using Genetic Algorithms

This paper presents a genetic-based approach to multi-criteria position and configuration optimisation of mobile manipulator systems. Optimisation criteria include obstacle avoidance, least joint torque norm, manipulability and joint torque distribution. Due to the competition among various criteria, the multi-criteria optimisation problem typically exhibits many local minima. The emphasis of the paper is put on using genetic algorithms to search for global optimum and solve the minilnax problem for torque distribution. Various simulations for a system including a three-link lnanipulator mounted on a mobile platform show that the proposed genetic algorithm approach performs better than conventional methods.