This paper presents the gatekeeper algorithm, a real-time and computationally-lightweight method to ensure that nonlinear systems can operate safely within unknown and dynamic environments despite limited perception. gatekeeper integrates with existing path planners and feedback controllers by introducing an additional verification step that ensures that proposed trajectories can be executed safely, despite nonlinear dynamics subject to bounded disturbances, input constraints and partial knowledge of the environment. Our key contribution is that (A) we propose an algorithm to recursively construct committed trajectories, and (B) we prove that tracking the committed trajectory ensures the system is safe for all time into the future. The method is demonstrated on a complicated firefighting mission in a dynamic environment, and compares against the state-of-the-art techniques for similar problems.

翻译：本文提出门卫算法，一种实时且计算轻量级的方法，以确保非线性系统在未知和动态环境中能够安全运行，尽管感知能力有限。该方法通过引入额外的验证步骤，与现有路径规划器和反馈控制器集成，确保所提议的轨迹能够在存在有界扰动、输入约束及环境部分未知的情况下安全执行。我们的核心贡献在于：(A) 提出一种递归构建承诺轨迹的算法；(B) 证明跟踪承诺轨迹能确保系统在未来所有时间内保持安全。该方法在动态环境中的复杂消防任务中进行了验证，并与同类问题的最新技术进行了对比。