Budgeting Samples for Exploration in Unknown Environments

Abstract

This paper presents an algorithm that improves previous efforts to incorporate ecological models of foraging into automating exoplanetary exploration. The new budgeting strategy is an improvement over previous approaches in that it attempts to exhaust its sampling budget while exploring. Simulated experiments demonstrate that the budgeting algorithm is also a better approach for small budget sizes thank more traditional approaches based on principles from the design of experiments.