Artificial immune system based framework for multi-robot cooperation

Abstract

Biological immune system is a combination of organs, tissues and cells that work collectively like a network to defend the body from the attack of pathogens. The immune system is very complex and amazingly organized. It can identify and memorize millions of various foreign invaders. Idiotypic network theory presented by Jerne explains the suppression and stimulation of the antibody in reaction to an antigen and other antibodies. The concept of immune system and Idiotypic network theory is applied to multi robot cooperation in this study. The proposed methodology is decentralized and autonomous. The robots in the developed system, work efficiently to accomplish a task alone or cooperatively. The coordination and communication among different robots in this work is established by utilizing the concept of immune system and a model of Idiotypic network theory. The developed methodology is successfully implemented in a group of simulated heterogeneous robots. The simulated robots move several objects to a specified position.