Kinematic Constraints

Abstract

In this chapter we study the path planning problem for a robot subject to kinematic constraints, i.e. an object (or a collection of objects) that cannot translate and rotate freely in the workspace. Indeed, so far, we have only investigated the case of free-flying robots. The only exception occurred in the last section of the previous chapter, when we considered articulated robots made of several objects connected by joints. The constraint imposed by a joint on the relative motion of the two objects it connects is a simple example of kinematic constraint.