13 accepted papers
A common robotics sensing problem is to place sensors to robustly monitor a set of assets, where robustness is assured by requiring asset <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">$p$</tex> to be monitored by at least <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3
We present progress on the problem of reconfiguring a 2D arrangement of building material by a cooperative group of robots. These robots must avoid collisions, deadlocks, and are subjected to the constraint of maintaining connectivity of the structure. We develop two reconfiguration methods, one bas…
For biomedical applications in targeted therapy delivery and interventions, a large swarm of micro-scale particles (“agents”) has to be moved through a maze-like environment (“vascular system”) to a target region (“tumor”). Due to limited on-board capabilities, these agents cannot move autonomously;…
We present theoretical and practical methods for achieving arbitrary reconfiguration of a set of objects, based on the use of external forces, such as a magnetic field or gravity: Upon actuation, each object is pushed in the same direction until it collides with an obstruction. This concept can be u
We consider recognition and reconfiguration of lattice-based cellular structures by very simple robots with only basic functionality. The underlying motivation is the construction and modification of space facilities of enormous dimensions, where the combination of new materials with extremely simpl…
We investigate algorithmic approaches for targeted drug delivery in a complex, maze-like environment, such as a vascular system. The basic scenario is given by a large swarm of micro-scale particles ("agents") and a particular target region ("tumor") within a system of passageways. Agents are too sm…
We prove that by successively combining subassemblies, we can achieve sublinear construction times for “staged” assembly of microscale objects from a large number of tiny particles, for vast classes of shapes; this is a significant advance in the context of programmable matter and self-assembly for
This paper studies the general problem of physically sorting polyominoes according to shape using a 2D, rigid, grid-based workspace. The workspace is designed for sensorless operation, using a fixed set of open-loop force-field inputs that move a polyomino from an inlet port to an outlet port that c
We propose an approach to mapping tissue and vascular systems without the use of contrast agents, based on moving and measuring magnetic particles. To this end, we consider a swarm of particles in a 1D or 2D grid that can be tracked and controlled by an external agent. Control inputs are applied uni…
We consider the problem of organizing a scattered group of n robots in two-dimensional space. The communication graph of the swarm is connected, but there is no central authority for organizing it. We want to arrange them into a sorted and equally-spaced array between the robots with lowest and high…
We present a number of powerful local mechanisms for maintaining a dynamic swarm of robots with limited capabilities and information, in the presence of external forces and permanent node failures. We propose a set of local continuous algorithms that together produce a generalization of a Euclidean…
We present and analyze methods for patrolling and surveillance in an environment with a distributed swarm of robots with limited capabilities. Our approach is based on a distributed triangulation of the work space, in which a set of p stationary sensors provides coverage control; in addition, there…
We present fundamental progress on the computational universality of swarms of micro- or nano-scale robots in complex environments, controlled not by individual navigation, but by a uniform global, external force. Consider a 2D grid world, in which all obstacles and robots are unit squares, and for…