CAREER: Distributed Coordination Strategies for Mobile Autonomous Agents

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CAREER: Distributed Coordination Strategies for Mobile Autonomous AgentsDepartment of Electrical and Systems Engineering, University of PennsylvaniaThis proposal is aimed at developing tools for analysis and design of distributed algorithms for co-ordinationof groups of mobile autonomous agents. Such coordination algorithms have appeared invarious disciplines in different contexts, ranging from biological sciences (aggregation and socialcohesion in animal species) to systems and control theory and collective robotics (cooperative con-trolof multi-vehicle systems), and from statistical physics (non-equilibrium phenomena in manydegree-of-freedom dynamical systems) to computer graphics (artificial life, simulated flocking).We plan to develop a unified theory which provides a provably correct analysis and synthesis ofdistributed coordination and collective synchronization among a network of mobile agents with achanging topology. Several key problems are formulated and road-maps for obtaining efficient andscalable solutions to the problems are discussed. The proposed research plan utilizes tools fromalgebraic and spectral theory of graphs, control theory and theory of dynamical systems.Intellectual Merit: Distributed coordination problems such as collective synchronization andflocking are ubiquitous in complex biological, engineering, and physical systems. Such prob-lemsarise in control theory, physics, biology, social sciences, power system networks and in timesynchronization in sensor networks. The common feature of all of the above problems is that a setof (possibly mobile) agents are interconnected using simple nearest neighbor rules in a networkwith a topology that is time varying. We plan to develop a unified framework which allows usto study these problems and synthesize coordinated and cooperative systems of multiple agents.Moreover, this study will provide a justification for the so called emergence of collective behaviorfrom simple local interactions, a phenomenon which has been observed across complex engineer-ingand natural systems.Broader Impacts: The proposed research will impact the study of complex engineering systems,ranging from operation and joint coordination of unmanned air, ground, and underwater vehiclesas well as coordination of a network of unmanned robots to perform search and rescue operations.The research will also impact other emerging applications in homeland security, defense, trans-portation,wireless communication, and electric power networks, which require networks of agentsto be capable of multi-user communication, collaborative information processing, and distributedcomputation, actuation, and control. The research plan is also accompanied by an active educa-tionplan consisting of undergraduate and graduate level course development, which will provide aframework for studying problems involving dynamic systems over networks. The plan is designedto involve undergraduate students in research and provide them with a well-defined plan of studyto help motivate them to pursue an advanced degree. It would also bring research across severalareas of science and systems theory together in a single unifying framework.