Virtual Pheromones for Real-Time Control of Autonomous Mobile Robots

Ioan Susnea, Grigore Vasiliu, Adrian Filipescu, Adrian Radaschin
Department of Automation and Industrial Informatics
“Dunărea de Jos” University, Galaţi, România

Abstract:

This paper presents a novel implementation of the concept of “virtual pheromones” for controlling autonomous mobile robots. Instead of deploying chemicals, RFID tags, or other traceable marks in the environment, the virtual pheromones are stored in a map of the environment maintained and updated by a “pheromone server”. This map acts like a shared memory for all the agents, each of them communicating with the server via a radio link. No direct communication between agents is required. The pheromone server can be implemented on a regular computer, a portable device, or an embedded controller located on a robot. The technique described is applicable for guiding individual robots and robot swarms. This method can lead to significant simplification and cost reduction of the autonomous agents. Some possible applications are presented.

Keywords:

Virtual pheromones, Autonomous Mobile Robots, Path following, Swarm Intelligence, Exo-synapses, Embedded systems.

Ioan Susnea: Master of Engineering in Electronics, 1980 from Politehnica University of Bucharest, România, specializing in development of embedded systems for industrial applications. Since 2007, lecturer at the Department of Automation and Industrial Informatics of “Dunărea de jos” University in Galaţi, România, and a PhD candidate.

Dr. Adrian Filipescu: Master of Engineering in Control Engineering, 1981 from Politehnica University of Bucharest, România. Currently, Professor at the Department of Automation and Industrial Informatics of “Dunărea de jos”, University in Galaţi, România, Dean of the Faculty of Computer Science.

Dr. Grigore Vasiliu: Master of Engineering in Control Engineering, 1981 from Politehnica University of Bucharest, România. Currently, Lecturer at the Department of Automation and Industrial Informatics of “Dunărea de jos” University in Galaţi, România.

Adrian Radaschin: Master student at the Department of Automation and Industrial Informatics of the “Dunărea de jos ” University in Galaţi, România.

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CITE THIS PAPER AS:
Ioan SUSNEA, Grigore VASILIU, Adrian FILIPESCU, Adrian RADASCHIN, Virtual Pheromones for Real-Time Control of Autonomous Mobile Robots, Studies in Informatics and Control, ISSN 1220-1766, vol. 18 (3), pp. 233-240, 2009.