Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 1 hour per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and completing and reviewing this collection of information. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden to Department of Defense, Washington Headquarters Services, Directorate for Information The report is comprised of 5 sections. Section 1 provides an overview of the relevant research area and the issues addressed by the PI during the period of the Grant. Section 2 describes the research conducted and the results obtained, broken down to 7 subsections, each one covering a specific subarea. After a brief conclusions section (Section 3), the report contains a list of plenary talks and special colloquia given by the PI on topics covered by the Grant (Section 4), and a list of publications and conference presentations resulting from this research, along with additional bibliography cited in the report (Section 5).
SPONSORING / MONITORING AGENCY NAME(S) AND ADDRESS(ES) 10. SPONSOR/MONITOR'S ACRONYM(S)
SPONSOR/MONITOR'S REPORT NUMBER(S)
Overview of the Research Area and Issues AddressedAs wireless sensing and control become increasingly applicable in fields ranging from real-time alarm systems and vehicle systems to aeronautical guidance and formation control, the need for establishing a theoretical foundation for what is known as networked systems [R1] has grown likewise. Such systems have sensors and controllers distributed generally in an ad-hoc manner, but have to be connected virtually either through communication and information transmission or because of the need to achieve some level of performance driven by individual or common goals, or both. Any effective effort to develop a theoretical foundation for this relatively new paradigm necessitates pooling together of tools (both conceptual and algorithmic) from multiple seemingly disparate disciplines, such as control theory, information theory, coding, communication, computing, and game theory. Some salient aspects of this paradigm, and the challenging issues that arise in this context, which we have addressed in the research supported by this AFOSR grant, are as follows, where the generic term agents is used for entities that are responsible for decision making that leads to actions, be they sensors or controllers or even dynamical systems.