A Survey of Wheeled Mobile Manipulation: A DecisionMaking Perspective

Abstract

Mobile manipulators that combine base mobility with the dexterity of an articulated manipulator have gained popularity in numerous applications ranging from manufacturing and infrastructure inspection to domestic service. Deployments span a range of interaction tasks with the operational environment comprising minimal interaction tasks such as inspection and complex interaction tasks such as logistics resupply and assembly. This flexibility, offered by the redundancy, needs to be carefully orchestrated to realize enhanced performance. Thus, advanced decisionsupport methodologies and frameworks are crucial for successful mobile manipulation in (semi) autonomous and teleoperation contexts. Given the enormous scope of the literature, we restrict our attention to decisionsupport frameworks specifically in the context of wheeled mobile manipulation. Hence, here, we present a classification of wheeled mobile manipulation literature while accounting for its diversity. The intertwining of the deployment tasks, application arenas, and decisionmaking methodologies are discussed with an eye for future avenues for research.