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German Conference on Multiagent System Technologies

MATES 2014: Multiagent System Technologies pp 103–120Cite as

Orchestrating the Sequential Execution of Tasks by a Heterogeneous Set of Asynchronous Mobile Agents

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Part of the Lecture Notes in Computer Science book series (LNAI,volume 8732)

Abstract

Coordinated execution of a sequence of tasks by a group of heterogeneous agents possessing different capabilities is known to be a complex problem. Researchers have looked upon nature to capture the mechanisms embedded within the highly distributed swarms of insects to coordinate the execution of tasks by multiple entities. Stigmergy based interactions forms the key that regulates various processes within such swarms. This paper describes a technique by which a heterogeneous set of asynchronous mobile agents comprising a swarm commence the execution of their assigned tasks by coordinating amongst each-other using stigmergy. These mobile agents make use of stimulations from the environment to activate the execution of a sequence of tasks on a network of nodes in a near synchronous manner. A stigmergic cloning controller facilitates the cloning of on-demand agents to provide for parallel executions. The agents also inherently exhibit self-healing. The paper also describes results obtained from emulations performed over a LAN which proves the practical viability of the proposed approach.

Keywords

  • Synchronization
  • Swarm
  • Stigmergy
  • Mobile Agents
  • Stimulations
  • Population Control
  • Response Threshold

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  • DOI: 10.1007/978-3-319-11584-9_8
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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, Assam, India

    Shashi Shekhar Jha & Shivashankar B. Nair

Authors
  1. Shashi Shekhar Jha
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  2. Shivashankar B. Nair
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Technische Universität Clausthal, Clausthal-Zellerfeld, Germany

    Jörg P. Müller

  2. institut für Automatisierungs- und Softwaretechnik, Universität Stuttgart, Pfaffenwaldring 47, 70550, Stuttgart, Germany

    Michael Weyrich

  3. Instituto de Informática, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS), Caixa Postal 15064, 91501-970, Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil

    Ana L. C. Bazzan

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Jha, S.S., Nair, S.B. (2014). Orchestrating the Sequential Execution of Tasks by a Heterogeneous Set of Asynchronous Mobile Agents. In: Müller, J.P., Weyrich, M., Bazzan, A.L.C. (eds) Multiagent System Technologies. MATES 2014. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 8732. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-11584-9_8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-11584-9_8

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-11583-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-11584-9

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