Intelligence in Future NASA Swarm-based Missions.

Abstract

NASA is researching advanced technologies for future exploration missions using intelligent swarms of robotic vehicles. One of these missions is the Autonomous Nano Technology Swarm (ANTS) mission that will explore the asteroid belt using 1,000 cooperative autonomous spacecraft. The emergent properties of intelligent swarms make it a potentially powerful concept, but at the same time more difficult to design and implement. In addition, a reliance on intelligence in each of the spacecraft and collective intelligence in teams of spacecraft will be needed to successfully execute maneuvers in and around asteroids. Designing, verifying and validating this collective intelligence will be one of the major challenges of the mission.