Modeling Motion by the Integration of Topology and Time

A qualitative representational model and the corresponding reasoning process for integrating time and topological information is developed in this paper. In the calculus presented, topological information in function of the point of the time in which it is true is represented as an instance of the Constraint Satisfaction Problem. The resulting method can be applied to qualitative navigation of autonomous agents. The model presented in this paper will help us during the path planning task by describing the sequence of topological situations that the agent should find during its way to the target objective. A preliminary result of that application has been obtained by using qualitative representation of such spatial aspects for the autonomous simulated navigation of a Nomad-200 robot, on a structured environment of an easy corridor in a building.