Major Feedback Loops Supporting Artificial Evolution in Multi-modular Robotics

Abstract

In multi-modular reconfigurable robotics it is extremely challenging to develop control software that is able to generate robust but still flexible behavior of the 'robotic organism' that is formed by several independent robotic modules. We propose artificial evolution and self-organization as methodologies to develop such control software. In this article, we present our concept to evolve a self-organized multimodular robot. We decompose the network of feedbacks, that affect the evolutionary pathway and show why and how specific sub-components, which are involved in these feedbacks, should be subject of evolutionary adaptation. Self-organization is a major component of our framework and is implemented by a hormone-inspired controller governing the behavior of singular autonomous modules. We show first results, which were obtained by artificial evolution with our framework, and give an outlook of how the framework will be applied in future research.

Analysis and implementation of an Artificial Homeostatic Hormone System: A first case study in robotic hardware

“…In addition, we demonstrated that AHHS controllers can be implemented on real robotic hardware, and also robots with low computational capabilities (like the e-puck robot) can be controlled by these controllers. Although this article reports only an exemplary case study on robotic hardware, it gives justified hope that more complex behaviors can be generated on robots with these methods (see [7]). This will be done by successively adding new sensors to the system, which secret additional virtual hormones and interact with the basic driving and collision avoidance system.…”

“…Then we will implement more complex AHHS on robotic hardware. One significant extension will be the application of AHHS to swarm robots and on multi-modular robotic systems [7]. In such systems AHHS will be a very interesting control paradigm, as inter-robotic communication will be implemented similar to sensor-induced hormone secretion, thus, mimicking the step from uni-cellular organisms to multi-cellular lifeforms.…”

Engineering multi-agent systems using feedback loops and holarchies

“…The sequences of causes and effects define a loop (called feedback loop). Feedback loops have already been used in the context of MAS, for example, for applications such as manufacturing, collective robotics, simulation and information systems design (Brückener, 2000;Wolf and Holvoet, 2007;Caprarescu et al, 2009;Beurier et al, 2003;Schmickl et al, 2011).…”