The 5G mobile networks extend the capability for supporting collaborative robot operations in outdoor scenarios. However, the restricted battery life of robots still poses a major obstacle to their effective implementation and utilization in real scenarios. One of the most challenging situations is the execution of mission-critical tasks that require the use of various onboard sensors to perform simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) of unexplored environments. Given the time-sensitive nature of these tasks, completing them in the shortest possible time is of the highest importance. In this paper, we analyze the benefits of 5G-enabled collaborative robots by enhancing the intelligence of the robot operation through joint orchestration of Robot Operating System (ROS) and 5G resources for energysaving goals, addressing the problem from both offline and online manners. We propose OROS, a novel orchestration approach that minimizes mission-critical task completion times as well as overall energy consumption of 5G-connected robots by jointly optimizing robotic navigation and sensing together with infrastructure resources. We validate our 5G-enabled collaborative framework by means of Matlab/Simulink, ROS software and Gazebo simulator. Our results show an improvement between 3.65% and 11.98% in exploration task by exploiting 5G orchestration features for battery savings when using 3 robots.

翻译：5G移动网络扩展了在室外场景中支持协作机器人操作的能力。然而，机器人有限的电池寿命仍是其在真实场景中有效实施和利用的主要障碍。最具挑战性的情况之一是执行关键任务，这些任务需使用多种机载传感器对未知环境进行同步定位与建图（SLAM）。鉴于此类任务的时间敏感性，在最短时间内完成它们至关重要。本文通过联合编排机器人操作系统（ROS）与5G资源以增强机器人操作的智能性，从离线和在线两种方式解决节能目标问题，分析了5G赋能协作机器人的优势。我们提出了一种新型编排方法OROS，通过联合优化机器人导航、感知与基础设施资源，最小化5G连接机器人的关键任务完成时间及总体能耗。基于Matlab/Simulink、ROS软件和Gazebo仿真器验证了我们的5G赋能协作框架。结果表明，当使用3台机器人时，利用5G编排功能实现电池节能可使探索任务性能提升3.65%至11.98%。