Evolutionary Robot Swarm Cooperative Retrieval

Abstract

In nature bees and leaf-cutter ants communicate to improve cooperation during food retrieval. This research aims to model communication in a swarm of auton-omous robots. When food is identified robot communication is emitted within a limited range. Other robots within the range receive the communication and learn of the location and size of the food source. The simulation revealed that commu-nication improved the rate of cooperative food retrieval tasks. However a counter-productive chain reaction can occur when robots repeat communications from other robots causing cooperation errors. This can lead to a large number of robots travelling towards the same food source at the same time. The food becomes de-pleted, before some robots have arrived. Several robots continue to communicate food presence, before arriving at the food source to find it gone. Nature-inspired communication can enhance swarm behaviour without requiring a central control-ler and may be useful in autonomous drones or vehicles.