Probabilistic aggregation strategies in swarm robotic systems

Abstract

In this study, a systematic analysis of probabilistic aggregation strategies in swarm robotic systems is presented. A generic aggregation behavior is proposed as a combination of four basic behaviors: obstacle avoidance, approach, repel, and wait. The latter three basic behaviors are combined using a three-state finite state machine with two probabilistic transitions among them. Two different metrics were used to compare performance of strategies. Through systematic experiments, how the aggregation performance, as measured by these two metrics, change 1) with transition probabilities, 2) with number of simulation steps, and 3) with arena size, is studied.

Reconfigurable swarm robots for structural health monitoring: a brief review

“…In robotics, aggregation is deployed to get robots in a swarm sufficiently close together and communicate to each other with limited range. The self-organized aggregation behaviors for swarm robotic systems is essential to form a robot cluster and perform needed communication tasks (Soysal and Ş ahin 2005). Additionally, aggregation is used for swarm robotic behaviors such as self-assembly and pattern formation (Erol and Ec 2007).…”

A distance weighted-based approach for self-organized aggregation in robot swarms

“…Garnier et al [13] adopted a probabilistic approach to achieve aggregation within a swarm of 20 physical Alice robots in homogeneous environments. Soysal and Sahin [14] suggested a probabilistic aggregation method in which state finite machine is used to combine a set of simple behaviors (obstacle avoidance, approach, repel, and wait). Ando et al [15] proposed a deterministic approach using graph theory to study aggregation in a group of mobile robots with a limited sensing range.…”

Power-Law Distribution of Long-Term Experimental Data in Swarm Robotics

“…Stochastic characteristic of swarm algorithms leads to use a probabilistic modelling to depict the collective behaviour of the swarm systems [20]. To that end, various models from macroscopic behaviours of swarms have been proposed in [10,13,14].…”