# DARE
**Repository Path**: wrd666/DARE
## Basic Information
- **Project Name**: DARE
- **Description**: No description available
- **Primary Language**: Unknown
- **License**: MIT
- **Default Branch**: main
- **Homepage**: None
- **GVP Project**: No
## Statistics
- **Stars**: 0
- **Forks**: 0
- **Created**: 2026-03-24
- **Last Updated**: 2026-03-24
## Categories & Tags
**Categories**: Uncategorized
**Tags**: None
## README
DARE: Diffusion Policy to Autonomous Robotics Exploration
[](https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/11128196)
[](https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.16687)
[](https://ubuntu.com/blog/tag/22-04-lts)
[]()
---
## Introduction
Autonomous robot exploration requires efficient path planning to map unknown environments. While conventional methods are often limited to optimizing based on current beliefs, **DARE (Diffusion Policy for Autonomous Robot Exploration)** leverages the power of generative AI to reason about unknown areas by drawing on learned experiences.
DARE is a novel approach that utilizes **diffusion models** trained on expert demonstrations to explicitly generate long-horizon exploration paths. By combining an attention-based encoder with a diffusion policy, DARE learns to recognize potential structures in unknown regions from partial beliefs, enabling it to plan paths that consider these unobserved areas.
**Key Features:**
* **Generative Path Planning:** Uses diffusion models to explicitly generate efficient exploration paths.
* **Expert Demonstrations:** Trained on ground truth optimal demonstrations to learn superior exploration patterns.
* **Structure Reasoning:** Capable of reasoning about potential structures in unknown areas based on partial beliefs.
* **Robust Performance:** Achieves state-of-the-art performance with strong generalizability in both simulation and real-world scenarios.
---
## Usage
### Requirements
Install the following dependencies in a conda environment as shown below:
```bash
git clone https://github.com/marmotlab/DARE.git && cd DARE
conda create -n env_dare python=3.12.9 -y
conda activate env_dare
pip install -e .
```
### Dataset Collection
Modify `dataset_parameter.py` to fit your dataset needs then run dataset collection script:
```bash
python dataset_driver.py
```
Dataset will be saved to directory `diffusion_exploration/dataset/name_of_test`.
It will include a `data.zarr` directory which contains the dataset and a `gifs` directory.
### Policy Training
Copy desired training config file from `diffusion_exploration/diffusion_policy/config`.
Modify desired task config file from `diffusion_exploration/diffusion_policy/config/task`.
**Note:** You probably should modify the `zarr_path` to change dataset location
You can run the training script which requires two arguements:
1. `--config-dir` which is the directory to find the config file
2. `--config-name` which is the name of the config file
```bash
python train.py --config-dir=. --config-name=train_exploration_transformer_node_discrete.yaml
```
This will create a directory `diffusion_exploration/data/date/time/name_of_run`
### Evaluation
Modify `test_parameter.py` to fit your test needs then run evaluation script:
```bash
python test_driver.py
```
Test results will be printed on terminal and saved as a CSV
`inference_gifs` directory will be created in `diffusion_exploration/data/date/time/name_of_run`.
---
## Credit
If you find this work useful, please consider citing us and the following works:
+ DARE: Diffusion Policy for Autonomous Robot Exploration
```bibtex
@inproceedings{cao2025dare,
author={Cao, Yuhong and Lew, Jeric and Liang, Jingsong and Cheng, Jin and Sartoretti, Guillaume},
booktitle={2025 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)},
title={DARE: Diffusion Policy for Autonomous Robot Exploration},
year={2025},
pages={11987-11993},
doi={10.1109/ICRA55743.2025.11128196}}
}
```
+ ARiADNE: A Reinforcement learning approach using Attention-based Deep Networks for Exploration
```bibtex
@inproceedings{cao2023ariadne,
author={Cao, Yuhong and Hou, Tianxiang and Wang, Yizhuo and Yi, Xian and Sartoretti, Guillaume},
booktitle={2023 IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)},
title={ARiADNE: A Reinforcement learning approach using Attention-based Deep Networks for Exploration},
year={2023},
pages={10219-10225},
doi={10.1109/ICRA48891.2023.10160565}
}
```
+ Deep Reinforcement Learning-based Large-scale Robot Exploration
```bibtex
@article{cao2024deepreinforcementlearningbasedlargescale,
author={Cao, Yuhong and Zhao, Rui and Wang, Yizhuo and Xiang, Bairan and Sartoretti, Guillaume},
journal={IEEE Robotics and Automation Letters},
title={Deep Reinforcement Learning-Based Large-Scale Robot Exploration},
year={2024},
volume={9},
number={5},
pages={4631-4638},
keywords={Training;Planning;Predictive models;Simultaneous localization and mapping;Trajectory;Three-dimensional displays;Reinforcement learning;Path planning;Robot learning;View Planning for SLAM;reinforcement learning;motion and path planning},
doi={10.1109/LRA.2024.3379804}
}
```
+ Diffusion policy: Visuomotor policy learning via action diffusion
```bibtex
@inproceedings{chi2023diffusionpolicy,
title={Diffusion Policy: Visuomotor Policy Learning via Action Diffusion},
author={Chi, Cheng and Feng, Siyuan and Du, Yilun and Xu, Zhenjia and Cousineau, Eric and Burchfiel, Benjamin and Song, Shuran},
booktitle={Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems (RSS)},
year={2023}
}
@article{chi2024diffusionpolicy,
author = {Cheng Chi and Zhenjia Xu and Siyuan Feng and Eric Cousineau and Yilun Du and Benjamin Burchfiel and Russ Tedrake and Shuran Song},
title ={Diffusion Policy: Visuomotor Policy Learning via Action Diffusion},
journal = {The International Journal of Robotics Research},
year = {2024},
}
```
We build on the codebase from [Deep Reinforcement Learning-based Large-scale Robot Exploration](https://github.com/marmotlab/large-scale-DRL-exploration) and [Diffusion policy](https://github.com/real-stanford/diffusion_policy).
---