MaryAnne Fields

About

Maryanne Fields is a leading researcher in swarm robotics and human-swarm interaction, with a career focused on developing control strategies for unmanned vehicle teams. Her primary contributions lie in formation control using artificial potential fields, where she pioneered techniques that organize swarms of robots into precise geometric formations by constructing virtual surfaces from normal, sigmoid, and bivariate normal functions. Her two most-cited papers, "Unmanned ground vehicle swarm formation control using potential fields" (132 citations) and "Swarm Formation Control Utilizing Elliptical Surfaces and Limiting Functions" (131 citations), established foundational methods for controlling swarm geometry and individual member spacing while enabling obstacle avoidance. Fields has also made significant advances in heterogeneous swarms, coordinating unmanned ground vehicles with aerial systems, and in soldier-swarm interaction—designing interfaces and algorithms that allow human operators to effectively supervise and correct swarm actions in degraded battlefield conditions. Her work on multimodal controls and extreme scalability addresses critical Army needs for convoy security and situational awareness. With over 400 total citations across her publications, Fields continues to shape the field of autonomous robotic swarms, bridging theoretical control methods with practical military applications.

Research Focus

Key Achievements

Top Papers

1. 1
   Unmanned ground vehicle swarm formation control using potential fields

   132 citations · 2007
2. 2
   Swarm Formation Control Utilizing Elliptical Surfaces and Limiting Functions

   131 citations · 2009
3. 3
   Swarm Formation Control with Potential Fields Formed by Bivariate Normal Functions

   34 citations · 2006
4. 4
   Heterogeneous Swarm Formation Control Using Bivariate Normal Functions to Generate Potential Fields

   29 citations · 2006
5. 5
   Effective robot team control methodologies for battlefield applications

   28 citations · 2009
6. 6
   Swarm formation control utilizing ground and aerial unmanned systems

   18 citations · 2008
7. 7
   Multimodal controls for soldier/swarm interaction

   15 citations · 2011
8. 8
   Extreme Scalability: Designing Interfaces and Algorithms for Soldier-Robotic Swarm Interaction

   10 citations · 2009
9. 9
   Simulation tools for robotics research and assessment

   8 citations · 2016
10. 10
    Learning features while learning to classify: a cognitive model for autonomous systems

    6 citations · 2018

Key Collaborators

Contact & Links