SHF: Medium: Collaborative Research: Formal Analysis and Synthesis of Multiagent Systems with Incentives

该项目开发了具有激励机制的多智能体系统的工具辅助设计和分析的自动化方法。这些系统是现实世界场景的自然模型，在这些场景中，参与者的集合以自主和自利的方式相互作用。例如，这样的系统可以模拟一组参与基于互联网的协议的软件代理，例如广告拍卖或加密货币；共享物理或数字基础设施的机器人集合；或者是一组参与进化过程的细胞。该项目结合了博弈论和逻辑方法来开发正式建模、分析、验证和综合这些系统的技术。该项目的最终目标包括管理自主代理之间交互的可靠协议工程，以及对自然发生的博弈论交互的计算机辅助理解。该项目的技术方法有三个方面。首先是开发新的形式模型，正确性要求，以及具有激励的多智能体系统的抽象和推理原则。研究方向包括多智能体系统中更丰富的均衡概念，以及相互作用和随机化对均衡的影响。其次，该项目研究了用于分析和验证多智能体系统的算法工具，这些系统具有关于系统行为和平衡的期望需求的激励。第三个方向是自动综合机制，以保证期望的性能。来自一系列领域的应用，包括金融协议、机器人和生物学，被用来指导和评估研究。

The project develops automated methods for the tool-aided design and analysis of multi-agent systems with incentives. These systems are natural models for real-world situations in which collections of actors interact with one another in an autonomous and self-interested manner. For example, such a system can model a set of software agents that participate in an internet-based protocol, such as an advertisement auction or crypto currency; a collection of robots that share physical or digital infrastructure; or a set of cells that participate in an evolutionary process. The project combines game-theoretic and logical methods to develop techniques for formal modeling, analysis, verification, and synthesis of such systems. The end objectives of the project include reliable engineering of protocols that govern interactions among autonomous agents, and computer-aided understanding of naturally occurring game-theoretic interactions.The technical approach of the project has three dimensions. The first is the development of new formal models, correctness requirements, and abstraction and reasoning principles for multi-agent systems with incentives. Research directions include richer notions of equilibria in multi-agent systems, and effects of interaction and randomization on equilibria. Second, the project studies algorithmic tools for analysis and verification of multi-agent systems with incentives with respect to desired requirements regarding system behaviors and equilibria. The third direction is to automatically synthesize mechanisms so as to guarantee desired properties. Applications from a range of areas, including financial protocols, robotics, and biology, are used to guide and evaluate the research.