Enhancing Robotics Online 3D Bin Packing: A Comparative Study of Conventional Heuristic and Deep Reinforcement Learning Approaches
Research output: Contribution to book/Conference proceedings/Anthology/Report › Conference contribution › Contributed › peer-review
Contributors
Abstract
Robotic object packing holds a wide array of practical applications across logistics and manufacturing sectors. The online 3D Bin Packing Problem (BPP) is a challenging task that involves online packing of three-dimensional boxes into a container while considering constraints and objectives. Unlike the offline version, where all boxes are known in advance, the online variant requires decisions about how to pack each box as it arrives, without prior knowledge of upcoming boxes.To maximize space utilization, our study explores two distinct strategies: conventional heuristics-based algorithms and a deep reinforcement learning (DRL)-based approach. For the heuristic strategy, we propose four heuristic criteria alongside two variants of multi-objective optimization (MOO) algorithms. Quantitative experiments reveal that MOO outperforms single-objective approaches for online bin packing. In our DRL-based approach, we introduce a framework that leverages a candidate map that indicates the potentially feasible placements, ensuring a balanced exploration and exploitation in the considerable discrete action space. Experiments demonstrate the superior performance of our DRL-based approach compared to both DRL-based baseline methods and conventional approaches. Additionally, we discuss the limitations of DRL-based methods and offer practical recommendations for real-world applications.
Details
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | 2024 IEEE 20th International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering, CASE 2024 |
Publisher | IEEE Computer Society |
Pages | 4083-4089 |
Number of pages | 7 |
ISBN (electronic) | 979-8-3503-5851-3 |
ISBN (print) | 979-8-3503-5852-0 |
Publication status | Published - 1 Sept 2024 |
Peer-reviewed | Yes |
Publication series
Series | IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering |
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ISSN | 2161-8070 |
Conference
Title | 20th IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering, CASE 2024 |
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Duration | 28 August - 1 September 2024 |
City | Bari |
Country | Italy |
External IDs
Ieee | 10.1109/CASE59546.2024.10711723 |
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Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Keywords
- Three-dimensional displays, Computer aided software engineering, Heuristic algorithms, Containers, Deep reinforcement learning, Explosions, Manufacturing, Robots, Optimization, Logistics