Related papers: Programmable collective behavior in dynamically se…
This paper proposes a novel swarm-based control algorithm for exploration and coverage of unknown environments, while maintaining a formation that permits short-range communication. The algorithm combines two elements: swarm rules for…
Robotic swarms are decentralized multi-robot systems whose members use local information from proximal neighbors to execute simple reactive control laws that result in emergent collective behaviors. In contrast, members of a general…
This paper studies the problem of having mobile robots in a multi-robot system maintain an estimate of the relative position and relative orientation of near-by robots in the environment. This problem is studied in the context of large…
In this paper, we present a heterogeneous robot swarm system that can physically couple with each other to form functional structures and dynamically decouple to perform individual tasks. The connection between robots can be formed with a…
We introduce shape-changing swarm robots. A swarm of self-transformable robots can both individually and collectively change their configuration to display information, actuate objects, act as tangible controllers, visualize data, and…
We present a decentralized algorithm to achieve segregation into an arbitrary number of groups with swarms of autonomous robots. The distinguishing feature of our approach is in the minimalistic assumptions on which it is based.…
Practical deployments of coordinated fleets of mobile robots in different environments have revealed the benefits of maintaining small distances between robots, especially as they move at higher speeds. However, this is counter-intuitive in…
For decades, robotics researchers have pursued various tasks for multi-robot systems, from cooperative manipulation to search and rescue. These tasks are multi-robot extensions of classical robotic tasks and often optimized on dimensions…
Humans have an impressive ability to solve complex coordination problems in a fully distributed manner. This ability, if learned as a set of distributed multirobot coordination strategies, can enable programming large groups of robots to…
Recent empirical observations of three-dimensional bird flocks and human crowds have challenged the long-prevailing assumption that a metric interaction distance rules swarming behaviors. In some cases, individual agents are found to be…
We present an approach to the distributed storage of data across a swarm of mobile robots that forms a shared global memory. We assume that external storage infrastructure is absent, and that each robot is capable of devoting a quota of…
We propose a scalable cooperative control approach which coordinates a group of rigidly connected autonomous surface vessels to track desired trajectories in a planar water environment as a single floating modular structure. Our approach…
Control policy learning for modular robot locomotion has previously been limited to proprioceptive feedback and flat terrain. This paper develops policies for modular systems with vision traversing more challenging environments. These…
Swarm User Interfaces allow dynamic arrangement of user environments through the use of multiple mobile robots, but their operational range is typically confined to a single plane due to constraints imposed by their two-wheel propulsion…
A mixture of particles with perception-dependent motility and opposite misaligned visual perception shows to spontaneously self-organize into a self-propelling bean-shaped cluster. The two species initially rotate in opposite directions,…
Robot swarms have been shown to improve the ability of individual robots by inter-robot collaboration. In this paper, we present the PuzzleBots - a low-cost robotic swarm system where robots can physically couple with each other to form…
Social insects in nature such as ants, termites and bees construct their colonies collaboratively in a very efficient process. In these swarms, each insect contributes to the construction task individually showing redundant and parallel…
Swarm foraging is a common test case application for multi-robot systems. In this paper we present a novel algorithm for controlling swarm robots with limited communication range and storage capacity to efficiently search for and retrieve…
We present a number of powerful local mechanisms for maintaining a dynamic swarm of robots with limited capabilities and information, in the presence of external forces and permanent node failures. We propose a set of local continuous…
A number of coordinated behaviors have been proposed for achieving specific tasks for multi-robot systems. However, since most applications require more than one such behavior, one needs to be able to compose together sequences of behaviors…