Flocking for Heterogeneous Robot Swarms: A Military Convoy Scenario

In this paper we apply a popular flocking control algorithm to a heterogeneous swarm of robots. The flocking controller contains separation, cohesion and velocity matching terms and has been shown to converge properly in the case of homogeneous swarms. The swarm models a military convoy unit with supply vehicles, defenders, and attackers. Each class of vehicle possesses different maneuvering capabilities and different objectives. In each case we modify the controller accordingly and analyze the emergent behavior of the swarm.

I. Introduction

Swarm control is a rapidly growing field in robotics. The premise of swarm robotics is that there are numerous advantages of using a group of relatively simple robots to accomplish a task over using a single highly complex robot. In swarm robotics, control is decentralized by assigning to each swarm member a simple control method that, when integrated into the full swarm, will result in higher-level swarm performance that appears to be based on a highly-sophisticated control system. The performance of the swarm that results from linking the swarm robots together is known as emergent behavior.