Reward Signal Design for Autonomous Racing

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Evans, Benjamin, Engelbrecht, Herman A., Jordaan, Hendrik W.
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2021
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author Evans, Benjamin
Engelbrecht, Herman A.
Jordaan, Hendrik W.
author_facet Evans, Benjamin
Engelbrecht, Herman A.
Jordaan, Hendrik W.
contents Reinforcement learning (RL) has shown to be a valuable tool in training neural networks for autonomous motion planning. The application of RL to a specific problem is dependent on a reward signal to quantify how good or bad a certain action is. This paper addresses the problem of reward signal design for robotic control in the context of local planning for autonomous racing. We aim to design reward signals that are able to perform well in multiple, competing, continuous metrics. Three different methodologies of position-based, velocity-based, and action-based rewards are considered and evaluated in the context of F1/10th racing. A novel method of rewarding the agent on its state relative to an optimal trajectory is presented. Agents are trained and tested in simulation and the behaviors generated by the reward signals are compared to each other on the basis of average lap time and completion rate. The results indicate that a reward based on the distance and velocity relative to a minimum curvature trajectory produces the fastest lap times.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2103_10098
institution arXiv
publishDate 2021
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Reward Signal Design for Autonomous Racing
Evans, Benjamin
Engelbrecht, Herman A.
Jordaan, Hendrik W.
Robotics
Reinforcement learning (RL) has shown to be a valuable tool in training neural networks for autonomous motion planning. The application of RL to a specific problem is dependent on a reward signal to quantify how good or bad a certain action is. This paper addresses the problem of reward signal design for robotic control in the context of local planning for autonomous racing. We aim to design reward signals that are able to perform well in multiple, competing, continuous metrics. Three different methodologies of position-based, velocity-based, and action-based rewards are considered and evaluated in the context of F1/10th racing. A novel method of rewarding the agent on its state relative to an optimal trajectory is presented. Agents are trained and tested in simulation and the behaviors generated by the reward signals are compared to each other on the basis of average lap time and completion rate. The results indicate that a reward based on the distance and velocity relative to a minimum curvature trajectory produces the fastest lap times.
title Reward Signal Design for Autonomous Racing
topic Robotics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2103.10098