Conflict management in an intelligent multiagent robotic system

Abstract

The paper presents a methodology and methods that allows a robotic system comprised of intelligent robotic agents to coordinate and negotiate their actions in order to achieve common goals. Each individual robotic agent consists of several autonomous components of its control system that allow the agent to perceive and react to its environment, to plan and execute an action, and to negotiate with other agents in an intelligent manner. Particular emphasis is placed on the negotiation and coordination process between two conflicting agents. Here, the workspace shared by both agents is treated as a common resource, and the coordination problem becomes a resource allocation problem. Strategies for conflict prevention and compromise strategies are presented in detail and implemented in a simulation.