Formation control is a classical problem and has been a prime topic of interest among the scientific community in the past few years. Although a vast amount of literature exists in this field, there are still many open questions that require an in-depth understanding and a new perspective. This thesis contributes towards exploring the wide dimensions of formation control and implementing a formation control scheme for a group of multi-agent systems. These systems are autonomous in nature and are represented by double integrated dynamics. It is assumed that the agents are connected in an undirected graph and use a leader-follower architecture to reach formation when the leading agent is given a velocity that is piecewise constant. A MATLAB code is written for the implementation of formation and the consensus-based control laws are verified. Understanding the effects on formation due to a fixed formation geometry is also observed and reported. Also, a link that describes the functional similarity between desired formation geometry and the Laplacian matrix has been observed. The use of Laplacian matrix in stability analysis of the formation is of special interest.

Doctor of Philosophy / Computing and Information Sciences / Scott A. DeLoach / As sensor prices drop and computing devices continue to become more compact and powerful, computing capabilities are being embedded throughout our physical environment. Connecting these devices in cyber-physical systems (CPS) enables applications with significant societal impact and economic benefit. However, engineering CPS poses modeling, architecture, and engineering challenges and, to fully realize the desired benefits, many outstanding challenges must be addressed. For the cyber parts of CPS, two decades of work in the design of autonomous agents and multiagent systems (MAS) offers design principles for distributed intelligent systems and formalizations for agent-oriented software engineering (AOSE). MAS foundations offer a natural fit for enabling distributed interacting devices. In some cases, complex control structures such as holarchies can be advantageous. These can motivate complex organizational strategies when implementing such systems with a MAS, and some designs may require agents to act in multiple groups simultaneously. Such agents must be able to manage their multiple associations and assignments in a consistent and unambiguous way. This thesis shows how designing agents as systems of intelligent subagents offers a reusable and practical approach to designing complex systems. It presents a set of flexible, reusable components developed for OBAA++, an organization-based architecture for single-group MAS, and shows how these components were used to develop the Adaptive Architecture for Systems of Intelligent Systems (AASIS) to enable multigroup agents suitable for complex, multigroup MAS. This work illustrates the reusability and flexibility of the approach by using AASIS to simulate a CPS for an intelligent power distribution system (IPDS) operating two multigroup MAS concurrently: one providing continuous voltage control and a second conducting discrete power auctions near sources of distributed generation.

Thesis (M. Tech. (Information Technology)) -- Central University of technology, Free State, 2011 / Traditional designs for component-handling platforms are rigidly linked to the product being produced. Control and monitoring methods for these platforms consist of various proprietary hardware controllers containing the control logic for the production process. Should the configuration of the component handling platform change, the controllers need to be taken offline and reprogrammed to take the changes into account. The current thinking in component-handling system design is the notion of re-configurability. Reconfigurability means that with minimum or no downtime the system can be adapted to produce another product type or overcome a device failure. The re-configurable component handling platform is built-up from groups of independent devices. These groups or cells are each responsible for some aspect of the overall production process. By moving or swopping different versions of these cells within the component-handling platform, re-configurability is achieved. Such a dynamic system requires a flexible communications platform and high-level software control architecture to accommodate the reconfigurable nature of the system. This work represents the design and testing of the core of a re-configurable production control software platform. Multiple software components work together to control and monitor a re-configurable component handling platform. The design and implementation of a production database, production ontology, communications architecture and the core multi-agent control application linking all these components together is presented.

Thesis (M. Tech. (Engineering: Electrical)) -- Central University of technology, Free State, [2014] / The project is aimed at exploring the application of Machine Vision in a Reconfigurable Manufacturing System (RMS) Environment. The Machine Vision System interfaces with the RMS to verify the reconfiguration and positioning of devices within the assembly system, and inspects the product for defects that infringe on the quality of that product. The vision system interfaces to the Multi-agent System (MAS), which is in charge of scheduling and allocating resources of the RMS, in order to communicate and exchange data regarding the quality of the product. The vision system is comprised of a Compact Vision System (CVS) device with fire-wire cameras to aid in the image acquisition, inspection and verification process. Various hardware and software manufacturers offer a platform to implement this with a multiple array of vision equipment and software packages. The most appropriate devices and software platform were identified for the implementation of the project. An investigation into illumination was also undertaken in order to determine whether external lighting sources would be required at the point of inspection. Integration into the assembly system involved the establishment communication between the vision system and assembly system controller.

La conception, l'étude et la gestion des systèmes du trafic urbain (STU) sont difficiles et coûteuses et sont des tâches très complexes. Dans ces systèmes, l'objectif principal est d'améliorer la circulation et d'optimiser la fluidité grâce à des règles de fonctionnement et de pilotage (qui constituent le sous-système décisionnel). L'approche distribuée du pilotage peut contribuer à la mise en place d'organisations agiles, combinant des logiques de réseaux et de hiérarchie. Cependant, le pilotage non centralisé des STU s'appuie fondamentalement sur les interactions d'entités communicantes, autonomes et capables de prendre des décisions. Ce travail s'intègre dans le développement de la méthodologie de modélisation ASCImi-STU (analyse, spécification, conception, implantation -multiple, incrémentielle pour les STU) qui a pour objectif d'apporter une aide à la conception et à la gestion des STU. La problématique liéé à la conception du sous-système décisionnel des STU est la maîtrise de la cohérence spatiale et temporelle des décisions, compte tenu des caractéristiques des systèmés pilotés et de leur environnement. Nous proposons pour le sous-système décisionnel une approche multi-agents et un outil d'aide à la décision pour améliorer la qualité de service aux usagers et pour résoudre des problèmes de planification au niveau stratégique, tactique et opérationnel.

Logic-based formalizations of dynamical systems are central to the field of knowledge representation and reasoning. These formalizations can be used to model agents that act, reason,and perceive in a changing and incompletely known environment. A key aspect of reasoning about agents and their behaviors is the notion of joint ability. A team of agents is jointly able to achieve a goal if despite any incomplete knowledge or even false beliefs about the world or each other, they still know enough to be able to get to a goal state, should they choose to do so. A particularly challenging issue associated with joint ability is how team members can coordinate their actions. Existing approaches often require the agents to communicate to agree on a joint plan. In this thesis, we propose an account of joint ability that supports coordination among agents without requiring communication, and that allows for agents to have incomplete (or even false) beliefs about the world or the beliefs of other agents. We use ideas from game theory to address coordination among agents. We introduce the notion of a strategy for each agent which is basically a plan that the agent knows how to follow. Each agent compares her strategies and iteratively discards those that she believes are not good considering the strategies that the other agents have kept. Our account is developed in the situation calculus, a logical language suitable for representing and reasoning about action and change that is extended to support reasoning about multiple agents. Through several examples involving public, private, and sensing actions, we demonstrate how symbolic proof techniques allow us to reason about team ability despite incomplete specifications about the beliefs of agents.

Neste trabalho é proposto um modelo para estimar a geração e a distribuição de viagens intraurbanas baseado em agentes, denominado Modelo GDA. Neste modelo foram aplicadas simulações em Sistemas Multiagentes (SMA), nas quais foram usadas, como dados de entrada, informações relativas ao morador e ao uso do solo. Na estimativa da geração de viagens, a simulação SMA foi usada para estimar uma população sintética baseada nas informações sociodemográficas dos moradores e para obter um plano de atividades associado a cada morador. Na estimativa da distribuição de viagens, a simulação SMA foi usada para obter uma matriz Origem-Destino (OD) com base no plano de atividades dos moradores e nos atributos do uso do solo. Para definir os critérios da distribuição de viagens, foram testadas teorias alternativas à força gravitacional, como a teoria das redes livres de escala e o conceito de path dependence. Foi feita uma aplicação do Modelo GDA na cidade de São Carlos (SP), cujos resultados estimados foram comparados aos resultados observados, provenientes da pesquisa Origem-Destino (OD), e aos resultados estimados obtidos pela aplicação de modelos gravitacionais nesta cidade. Os resultados mostraram que os resultados estimados obtidos pelo Modelo GDA são tão acurados quanto aos do modelo gravitacional. Conclui-se que o Modelo GDA, comparativamente ao modelo gravitacional, possui vantagens quanto à sua aplicabilidade, pois em vez de serem utilizados pelo modelo dados provenientes de pesquisas de tráfego, geralmente onerosos e de difícil aquisição; são empregados dados acerca do morador e do uso do solo, de fácil coleta e atualização periódica. / In this work, an agent-based model in order to estimate trip generation and trip distribution in an intra-urban context (GDA model) is proposed. Simulations using Multiagent Systems (MAS), with input data concerning dwellers and land use were applied in this model. To estimate the trip generation, the MAS simulation was used to elaborate a synthetic population based on sociodemographic information of the dwellers and to obtain an activity plan of each dweller. To estimate the trip distribution, the MAS simulation was used to obtain an Origin-Destiny (OD) matrix based on the dwellers activity plans and the land use characteristics. To define the trip distribution rules, alternative theories to gravitational force like free scale networks and path dependence theories were tested. The GDA model was applied in the urban area of São Carlos (Brazil), whose estimates was compared to the observed data from the OD survey and the estimate data from the Gravity model applied in this same area. The results showed that the estimates from the GDA Model are as accurate as from the Gravity Model. It was observed that the GDA Model presents advantages in relation to the Gravity Model because instead of using traffic survey data, which often is expensive and difficult to get, it uses dwellers and land use information, which is periodically collected from government researches, making it easy for government agencies to obtain this information.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-03-22T17:26:07Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Andre-Vinicius.pdf: 1143939 bytes, checksum: 6c38530394bdd70a84905edf6570f0b9 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-07-31 / Piaget s Theory of Social Exchanges has been used as the basis for interaction analysis in Multiagent Systems. These interactions are understood as processes of service exchanges between pairs of agents followed by the the evaluation of those services by the agents involved in the processes, producing values of social exchanges. The values emerged form those evaluations are of qualitative nature, that is, subjective values influenced by different aspects related to the internal nature of the agents or effects of the external environment. One of these aspects is the behavioral analysis of the agents in the evaluation process according to their personality traits. In a social exchange process, an agent assigns a value to its investment for performing a service to another agent, and the latter gives a value for its satisfaction in having received such a service. Subsequently, values of debits and credits are also generated, allowing for future exchanges. In this context, this work considers that the agents may assume different personality traits, which lead them to different attitudes concerning the exchanges they choose to perform, the way they evaluate the exchanges or the ways they manage their debits and credits. In the literature, there are some studies on the evaluation of social exchange values, either representing exchange values as numerical intervals (range of values) to simulate their qualitative nature, or obtaining those values using functions over parameters of objective or subjective nature, used for evaluation of exchanged services. In this work, we consider a qualitative method for evaluating social exchanges, considering only the material values of investment and satisfaction, based on Fuzzy Logic. The Fuzzy Logic is justified in this context, since it aims to model the human reasoning and the decision-making in a complex, subjective, incomplete environment, considering uncertainty and inaccuracy. In this dissertation, a service is defined as a set of attributes, whose evaluation based on fuzzy logic, considering different factors of personality, allows us to infer about the fuzzy values of that service, either related to the investment value (by the agent that performs the service) or to the satisfaction value (by the agent that receives the service). The fuzzy equations of material equilibrium in the two stages of social exchanges are also analyzed / A Teoria das Trocas Sociais de Piaget tem sido utilizada como base para a análise de interações em Sistemas Multiagente. Estas interações são compreendidas como processos de trocas de serviços entre pares de agentes seguidos da avaliação destes serviços por parte dos agentes envolvidos, produzindo valores de trocas sociais. Os valores de trocas derivados desta avaliação são de natureza qualitativa, isto é, valores subjetivos influenciados por diferentes aspectos relacionados à natureza interna dos agentes ou efeitos externos do ambiente. Um destes aspectos é a análise comportamental dos agentes no processo de avaliação conforme seus traços de personalidade. Em um processo de troca social, um agente atribui um valor ao seu investimento na realização de um serviço para outro agente e este último atribui um valor de satisfação por ter recebido tal serviço. Posteriormente, são gerados valores de débitos e créditos, que permitirão a realização de trocas futuras. Neste contexto, o presente trabalho considera que os agentes assumem diferentes traços de personalidades, o que os induzem a diferentes atitudes referentes às trocas que optam por realizar, formas como avaliam as trocas ou ainda as formas como administram seus débitos e créditos. Na literatura, alguns trabalhos realizam a avaliação dos valores de trocas sociais, sejam representando os valores de trocas como intervalos numéricos (faixas de valores), para simular sua natureza qualitativa, ou obtendo-os através de funções sobre parâmetros de natureza objetiva ou subjetiva, utilizadas para avaliação dos serviços trocados. Neste trabalho, considera-se um método qualitativo para avaliação de trocas sociais, considerando somente os valores materiais de investimento e satisfação, com base na Lógica Fuzzy. A Lógica Fuzzy justificase neste contexto, pois tem como objetivo modelar de forma aproximada o raciocínio humano e a tomada de decisões em um ambiente complexo, subjetivo, incompleto, de incerteza e imprecisão. Nesta dissertação, define-se um serviço como um conjunto de atributos, cuja avaliação baseada na Lógica Fuzzy, considerando diferentes fatores de personalidades, permite inferir sobre os valores fuzzy desse serviço, sejam com relação ao valor de investimento (por parte do agente que faz o serviço) ou de satisfação (por parte daquele que recebe o serviço). As equações fuzzy de equilíbrio material nos dois estágios de trocas sociais são também analisadas

Planners are well developed tools in computer science, but their role is rather limited in games. We decided to test the possibilities of writing such a game around them. Proving that freely available, general purpose planning systems are worthy alternatives to custom made solutions could open a new path to small developers and popularize a new kind of gameplay powered by these tools. We attempted to exploit planners in two roles, in the development, to partially automate the level design process; and in the gameplay as a decision making tool for the acting agents. Our program is a puzzle game, more precisely an anticipation game, where the player has to foresee the future actions of the acting agents, then discover the pitfalls where they are heading. Using this knowledge he can modify their environment and force them to a desired outcome. A part of our program is a generator of such game challenges. We came to a conclusion that within some limitations planners are capable of creating believable agent behavior and while not all decisions can be handed over to the planning systems, they can lighten the task of the level designer.

Made available in DSpace on 2015-04-29T15:10:48Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 ALEXANDRE PASSITO.pdf: 3822416 bytes, checksum: 4f278e2830ed590e916983c979c90872 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2012-12-04 / CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior / Autonomous networking research to applies intelligent agent and multiagent systems theory to network controlling mechanisms. Deploying such autonomous and rational entities in the network can improve its behavior in the presence of very dynamic and complex control scenarios. Unfortunately, building agent-based mechanisms for networks is not an easy task. The main difficulty is to create concise knowledge representations about network domains and reasoning mechanisms to deal with them. Furthermore, the Internet makes the design of multiagent systems for network controlling a challenging activity involving the modeling of different participants with diverse beliefs and intentions. Such type of system often poses scalability problems due to the lack of incentives for cooperation between administrative domains. Finally, as the current structure of the Internet often prevents innovation, constructed autonomous networking mechanisms are not fully deployed in large scale scenarios. The Software-Defined Networking (SDN) paradigm is in the realm of Future Internet efforts. In the SDN paradigm, packet forwarding hardware is controlled by software running as a separated control plane. Management software uses an open protocol to program the owtables in different switches and routers. This work presents a general discussion about the integration of autonomous networks and software-defined networks. Based on the knowledge offered by this discussion, it presents a framework that provides autonomy to SDN domains allowing them to act cooperatively when deployed in scenarios with distributed management. Two case studies are presented for important open issues in the Internet: (1) the problem of mitigating DDoS attacks when thousands of attackers perform malicious packet ooding and SDN domains must cooperate to cope with packet filtering at the source; (2) the problem of network traffic management when multiple domains must cooperate and modify routing primitives. / A pesquisa em redes autônomas aplica a teoria de agentes inteligentes e sistemas multiagente em mecanismos de controle de redes. Implantar esse mecanismos autônomos e racionais na rede pode melhorar seu comportamento na presença de cenários de controle muito complexos e dinâmicos. Infelizmente, a construção de mecanismos baseados em agentes para redes não é uma tarefa fácil. A principal dificuldade é criar representações concisas de conhecimento sobre os domínios de redes e mecanismos de raciocínio para lidar com elas. Além disso, a Internet faz com que o projeto de sistemas multiagente para o controle da rede seja uma atividade intrincada envolvendo a modelagem de diferentes participantes com diversas crenças e intenções. Esses tipos de sistemas geralmente apresentam problemas de escalabilidade devido à falta de incentivos para cooperação entre domínios administrativos. Finalmente, como a estrutura corrente da Internet geralmente impede inovações, mecanismos de redes autônomas construídos não são totalmente implantados em cenários de larga escala. O paradigma das redes definidas por software (SDN) está na esfera dos esforços da Internet do Futuro. No paradigma SDN, o hardware de repasse de pacotes é controlado por software sendo executado como um plano de controle separado. Softwares de gerenciamento utilizam um protocolo aberto que programa as tabelas de uxo em diferentes switches e roteadores. Este trabalho apresenta uma discussão geral sobre a integração de redes autônomas e redes definidas por software. Baseado no conhecimento oferecido por essa discussão, é apresentado um arcabouço que provê autonomia para domínios SDN, permitindo que eles atuem cooperativamente quando implantados em cenários com gerenciamento distribuído. Dois estudos de caso são apresentados para importantes questões em aberto na Internet: (1) o problema da mitigação de ataques DDoS quando milhares de atacantes realizam inundação por pacotes e os domínios SDN precisam cooperar para lidar com o filtro de pacotes na origem; (2) o problema do gerenciamento de tráfego da rede quando múltiplos domínios devem cooperar e realizar modificações nas primitivas de roteamento de redes.