Multi-UAV Cooperative Pursuit Planning via Communication-Aware Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning

Abstract

Cooperative pursuit using multi-UAV systems presents significant challenges in dynamic task allocation, real-time coordination, and trajectory optimization within complex environments. To address these issues, this paper proposes a reinforcement learning-based task planning framework that employs a distributed Actor–Critic architecture enhanced with bidirectional recurrent neural networks (BRNN). The pursuit–evasion scenario is modeled as a multi-agent Markov decision process, enabling each UAV to make informed decisions based on shared observations and coordinated strategies. A multi-stage reward function and a BRNN-driven communication mechanism are introduced to improve inter-agent collaboration and learning stability. Extensive simulations across various deployment scenarios, including 3-vs-1 and 5-vs-2 configurations, demonstrate that the proposed method achieves a success rate of at least 90% and reduces the average capture time by at least 19% compared to rule-based baselines, confirming its superior effectiveness, robustness, and scalability in cooperative pursuit missions.