journal article·2025-08-13Open access

An Improved Deep Reinforcement Learning-Based UAV Area Coverage Algorithm for an Unknown Dynamic Environment

Jiaoru Huang, Huxin Li, Chaobo Chen, Yushuang Liu, Xiaoyan Zhang

Applied Sciences· Volume 15· Issue 16

Abstract

With the widespread application of unmanned aerial vehicle technology in search and detection, express delivery and other fields, the requirements for unmanned aerial vehicle dynamic area coverage algorithms has become higher. For an unknown dynamic environment, an improved Dual-Attention Mechanism Double Deep Q-network area coverage algorithm is proposed in this paper. Firstly, a dual-channel attention mechanism is designed to deal with flight environment information. It can extract and fuse the features of the local obstacle information and full-area coverage information. Then, based on the traditional Double Deep Q-network algorithm, an adaptive exploration decay strategy and a coverage reward function are designed based on the real-time area coverage rate to meet the requirement of a low repeated coverage rate. The proposed algorithm can avoid dynamic obstacles and achieve global coverage under low repeated coverage rate conditions. Finally, with Python 3.12 and PyTorch 2.2.1 environment as the training platform, the simulation results show that, compared with the Soft Actor–Critic algorithm, the Double Deep Q-network algorithm, and the Attention Mechanism Double Deep Q-network algorithm, the proposed algorithm in this paper can complete the area coverage task in a dynamic and complex environment with a lower repeated coverage rate and higher coverage efficiency.
Source: crossref · Quality: baseline

Research context

OpenAlex topics: Distributed Control Multi-Agent Systems · UAV Applications and Optimization · Robotic Path Planning Algorithms

SciVX discovery tags are terminology-based. OpenAlex topics are source-provided classifications.

Affiliations

Shaanxi Autonomous Systems and Intelligent Control International Joint Research Center, Xi’an Technological University, Xi’an 710021, China

Beijing System Design Institute of Electro-Mechanic Engineering, Beijing 100854, China

Funding

Key Research and Development Program of Shaanxi · The Youth Innovation Team of Shaanxi Universities · Young Talent Nurturing Program of Shaanxi Provincial Science and Technology Association

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