A Stackelberg signaling game for co-operative rendezvous in uncertain environments in a search-and-rescue context

Search and rescue (SAR) operations are challenging in the absence of a medium of communication between the rescuers and the rescuee. Natural signaling, grounded in rationality, can play a decisive role in achieving rapid and effective mitigation in such rescue scenarios. In this work, we model a particular rescue scenario as a modified asymmetric rendezvous game where limited communication capabilities are present between the two players. The scenario can be modeled as a co-operative Stackelberg Game where the rescuer acts as a leader in signaling his intent to the rescuee. We present an efficient approach to obtaining the optimal signaling policy, as well as its robust counterpart, when the topology of the rescue environment is unknown. We also analyze the sensitivity of the optimal signaling policy to the velocities of the two players as further motivation for the robust solution. We observe that a completely robust approach in designing the signaling policy can lead to highly conservative solutions. To address this conservativeness, we then introduce a stochastic nature on the unknown topology and provide a signaling policy that probabilistic performance guarantees.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.S.

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Aerospace Engineering

Grantor

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Year dc:date

2021

Author dc:creator

• Hebbar, Vijeth

Contributors dc:contributor

• Langbort, Cedric

• Rescue Robotics

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright 2020 Vijeth Hebbar

Language dc:language

en

Handle dc:identifier

http://hdl.handle.net/2142/109455

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:www.ideals.illinois.edu:2142/109455