Control of Many Agents Using Few Instructions

— This paper considers the problem of controlling a group of agents under the constraint that every agent must be given the same control input. This problem is relevant for the control of mobile micro-robots that all receive the same power and control signals through an underlying substrate. Despite this restriction, several examples in simulation demonstrate that it is possible to get a group of micro-robots to perform useful tasks. All of these tasks are derived by thinking about the relationships between robots, rather than about their individual states.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2007
• Where: RSS
• Authors: Timothy Bretl
• Keywords: Control Input, Control Signals, Mobile Micro-robots, Robotics, RSS 2007