A remote lab for multi-robot experiments with virtual obstacles

Remote labs are increasingly being used as an effective tool for letting students practicing with real experiments, with limited effort and cost. A multi-robot setup, based on the LEGO Mindstorms technology and the Matlab environment, allowing students to experiment with real robots through the Internet, has been developed. In this paper, a novel feature of this setup is presented. The concept of virtual obstacles is introduced, and some obstacle avoidance experiments are reported in order to illustrate the main features of the proposed experimental environment.