Mission-critical operations, particularly in the context of Search-and-Rescue (SAR) and emergency response situations, demand optimal performance and efficiency from every component involved to maximize the success probability of such operations. In these settings, cellular-enabled collaborative robotic systems have emerged as invaluable assets, assisting first responders in several tasks, ranging from victim localization to hazardous area exploration. However, a critical limitation in the deployment of cellular-enabled collaborative robots in SAR missions is their energy budget, primarily supplied by batteries, which directly impacts their task execution and mobility. This paper tackles this problem, and proposes a search-and-rescue framework for cellular-enabled collaborative robots use cases that, taking as input the area size to be explored, the robots fleet size, their energy profile, exploration rate required and target response time, finds the minimum number of robots able to meet the SAR mission goals and the path they should follow to explore the area. Our results, i) show that first responders can rely on a SAR cellular-enabled robotics framework when planning mission-critical operations to take informed decisions with limited resources, and, ii) illustrate the number of robots versus explored area and response time trade-off depending on the type of robot: wheeled vs quadruped.

翻译：关键任务操作，特别是在搜索与救援（SAR）及紧急响应场景中，要求每个参与组件达到最优性能和效率，以最大化此类操作的成功概率。在此背景下，面向蜂窝网络的协作机器人系统已成为宝贵资产，协助第一响应者完成从受害者定位到危险区域探索的多项任务。然而，将蜂窝网络协作机器人部署于搜救任务时，一个关键限制在于其能量预算（主要由电池提供），这直接影响其任务执行与机动能力。本文针对此问题，提出一种面向蜂窝网络协作机器人用例的搜索与救援框架，该框架以待探索区域面积、机器人集群规模、能量曲线、所需探索速率及目标响应时间为输入，得出能够满足搜救任务目标的最小机器人数量及其探索区域应遵循的路径。我们的结果表明：i) 第一响应者在规划关键任务操作时，可依靠蜂窝网络搜救机器人框架，在资源有限的情况下做出知情决策；ii) 阐明了机器人数量与探索区域及响应时间之间的权衡关系，且该关系取决于机器人类型：轮式机器人 vs. 四足机器人。