optimal exploration of small rings
In [4], the authors look at probabilistic bounds and solutions for the exploration of anonymous unoriented rings of any size by a cohort of robots. Considering identical, oblivious, and probabilistic robots, they show that at least four of them are necessary to solve the problem. Moreover, they give a randomized protocol for four robots working in any ring of size more than eight. Here we close the question of optimal ( w.r.t. the cohort size) ring exploration by probabilistic robots. Indeed, we propose a protocol for four robots working in any ring of size less or equal to eight. Composing this protocol with the one in [4], we obtain a protocol for any ring-size.
ring exploration mobile robots probabilistic algorithm