Communication Maintenance of Robotic Parasitic Antenna Arrays

Abstract

Recent developments in low-VHF antenna design and parasitic antenna array research show it is possible to form multi-robot antenna arrays. These arrays have the potential to extend communication range in urban and indoor environments. However, existing control formulations are not general enough to support this new capability. We first propose a generalized version of a disk model that describes a parasitic array. This model is then integrated into a Fiedler maximization approach for maintaining communication. Through simulation, we test our approach and demonstrate its ability to increase communication range by increasing array size.