Related papers: A geometric condition for robot-swarm cohesion and…
Swarming behavior, where coherent motion emerges from the interactions of many mobile agents, is ubiquitous in physics and biology. Moreover, there are many efforts to replicate swarming dynamics in mobile robotic systems which take…
We have studied the collective motion of polar active particles confined to ellipsoidal surfaces. The geometric constraints lead to the formation of vortices that encircle surface points of constant curvature (umbilics). We have found that…
We describe in this paper an optimal control strategy for shaping a large-scale swarm of particles using boundary global actuation. This problem arises as a key challenge in many swarm robotics applications, especially when the robots are…
Collective decision-making is an essential capability of large-scale multi-robot systems to establish autonomy on the swarm level. A large portion of literature on collective decision-making in swarm robotics focuses on discrete decisions…
Dynamical clustering represents a characteristic feature of active matter consisting of self-propelled agents that convert energy from the environment into mechanical motion. At the micron scale, typical of overdamped dynamics, particles…
Swarm robotics is a creative method of organizing multi-robot structures, consisting of many basic robots influenced by communal insects. The greatest astonishing attribute of swarm robots is their capacity to function together to…
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…
Self-organized emergent patterns can be widely seen in particle interactions producing complex structures such as chemical elements and molecules. Inspired by these interactions, this work presents a novel stochastic approach that allows a…
We investigate motion planning algorithms for the assembly of shapes in the \emph{tilt model} in which unit-square tiles move in a grid world under the influence of uniform external forces and self-assemble according to certain rules. We…
We envision programmable matter as a system of nano-scale agents (called particles) with very limited computational capabilities that move and compute collectively to achieve a desired goal. We use the geometric amoebot model as our…
We report in experiment and simulation the spontaneous formation of dynamically bound pairs of shape changing robots undergoing locally repulsive collisions. These physical `gliders' robustly emerge from an ensemble of individually…
A system of particles with motility variable in terms of a vision-type of perception is here investigated by a combination of Langevin dynamics simulations in two-dimensional systems and an analytical approach based on conservation law…
We consider the problem of completely covering an unknown discrete environment with a swarm of asynchronous, frequently-crashing autonomous mobile robots. We represent the environment by a discrete graph, and task the robots with occupying…
We investigate experimentally the collective behavior of a wet granular monolayer under vertical vibrations. The spherical particles are partially wet such that there are short-ranged attractive interactions between adjacent particles. As…
Different from most of the formation strategies where robots require unique labels to identify topological neighbors to satisfy the predefined shape constraints, we here study the problem of identity-less distributed shape formation in…
Here we show that coupling to curvature has profound effects on collective motion in active systems, leading to patterns not observed in flat space. Biological examples of such active motion in curved environments are numerous: curvature…
In recent years the functionality of synthetic active microparticles has edged even closer to that of their biological counterparts. However, we still lack the understanding needed to recreate at the microscale key features of autonomous…
We investigate the self-organization of point-particles with short-range interactions modeled via simple 1D and 2D Hubbard-like models. We show how various properties emerge such as, boson-like ordering leading to topological structures in…
Controlling segregation is both a practical and a theoretical challenge. In this Letter we demonstrate a manner in which rotation-induced segregation may be controlled by altering the geometry of the rotating containers in which granular…
We have developed an experimental setup of very simple self-propelled robots to observe collective motion emerging as a result of inelastic collisions only. A circular pool and commercial RC boats were the basis of our first setup, where we…