Design of the peer agent for multi-robot communication in an agent-based robot control architecture

Abstract

The role of communication among mobile robots remains one of the most important issues in multi-agent robotics system design. There are many research groups currently working on communication and cooperation among robots. Cooperation requires communication whenever one’s actions depend critically on the knowledge that is accessible only from others. In the Intelligent Robotics Laboratory at Vanderbilt University, we are currently developing a method for robots to communicate and share knowledge with each other. We have developed the concept of the Peer Agent that will enable robots to exchange information between one another. The research experiment, described in this thesis, involved two mobile robots; Skeeter, a Pioneer 2-AT robot and Scooter, an ATRV-Jr robot. We will show that knowledge sharing through Peer Agents can lead to a more stable, robust and efficient cooperation between robots.