Modelling Multiple Robots in Space: An Adaptive Eco-Grammar System

Issue title: SPECIAL ISSUE ON DEVELOPMENTS IN GRAMMAR SYSTEMS

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Sebestyén, Peter | Sosík, Petr

Affiliations: Mathematical Institute, Silesian University, 74601 Opava, Czech Republic. E-mail: peter.sebestyen@math.slu.cz | Facultad de Informática, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Campus de Montegancedo s/n, Boadilla del Monte 28660, Madrid, Spain. E-mail: petr.sosik@fpf.slu.cz

Abstract: We present a multi-robot model suitable for study of interactions and emergence of rational behavior. We focus on a grammatical approach, and to demonstrate its advantages, we design a model of an adaptive multi-robot community in terms of eco-grammar systems. We show that this grammatical model, based on the blackbord architecture, can naturally involve reinforcement collective learning. We test two learning algorithms in a common environment with almost reactive co-operating robots. Experimental results show that using the grammatical model, the robot community can be successfully trained to find a close-to-optimal solution to a given NP-complete task of a truss construction.

Keywords: Robotics, formal grammar, eco-grammar system

Journal: Fundamenta Informaticae, vol. 76, no. 3, pp. 367-381, 2007