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Wang et al. Intell Robot 2023;3(4):538-64 Intelligence & Robotics
DOI: 10.20517/ir.2023.30

Research Article Open Access

Cooperative search for moving targets with the ability

to perceive and evade using multiple UAVs

Ziyi Wang, Wencheng Zou, Sheng Li
School of Automation, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing 210094, Jiangsu, China.

Correspondence to: Ziyi Wang, School of Automation, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, No.200 Xiao Lingwei
Street Xuanwu District, Nanjing 210094, Jiangsu, China. E-mail: mariowang@njust.edu.cn; ORCID: 0009-0004-2527-7409
How to cite this article: Wang Z, Guo J, Zou W, Li S. Cooperative search for moving targets with the ability to perceive and evade
using multiple UAVs. Intell Robot 2023;3(4):538-64. http://dx.doi.org/10.20517/ir.2023.30

Received: 1 Aug 2023 First Decision: 29 Aug 2023 Revised: 8 Sep 2023 Accepted: 16 Oct 2023 Published: 28 Oct 2023

Academic Editor: Haibin Duan Copy Editor: Yanbin Bai Production Editor: Yanbin Bai

Abstract
This paper focuses on the problem of regional cooperative search using multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for
targets that have the ability to perceive and evade. When UAVs search for moving targets in a mission area, the targets
can perceive the positions and flight direction of UAVs within certain limits and take corresponding evasive actions,
which makes the search more challenging than traditional search problems. To address this problem, we first define
a detailed motion model for such targets and design various search information maps and their update methods to
describe the environmental information based on the prediction of moving targets and the search results of UAVs. We
then establish a multi-UAV search path planning optimization model based on the model predictive control, which
includes various newly designed objective functions of search benefits and costs. We propose a priority-encoded
improved genetic algorithm with a fine-adjustment mechanism to solve this model. The simulation results show that
the proposed method can effectively improve the cooperative search efficiency, and more targets can be found at a
much faster rate compared to traditional search methods.

Keywords: Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), moving target search, path planning, fine-adjustment mechanism

1. INTRODUCTION
In recent years, with the continuous development of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technology, the appli-
cation of UAVs for searching civilian or military targets has been increasing. Path planning for target search

© The Author(s) 2023. Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0
International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, shar-
ing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, for any purpose, even commercially, as long as you
give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate
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