Nicholas Mastronarde

University at Buffalo, State University of New York

Papers

Total Citations

H-Index

About

Nicholas Mastronarde is a leading researcher in multi-robot coordination and networked autonomous systems, with a focus on enabling robust swarm intelligence under real-world communication constraints. His work addresses a critical gap in robotics: most multi-robot task allocation algorithms assume perfect communication, which fails in practical lossy network environments. Mastronarde’s seminal papers on decentralized task allocation in lossy networks and the Asynchronous Consensus Based Bundle Algorithm (ACBBA) have garnered over 24 combined citations, demonstrating their influence on the field. He developed the RF-SITL (Radio Frequency Software-in-the-Loop) channel emulator, integrated with the University at Buffalo’s Airborne Networking and Communications (UB-ANC) emulator, allowing researchers to realistically simulate UAV swarm networks with accurate wireless channel effects. This tool is pivotal for testing coordination algorithms before costly field deployments. Mastronarde’s contributions bridge the gap between theoretical multi-agent systems and practical deployment, making him a key figure in advancing resilient, communication-aware robotics for applications ranging from search-and-rescue to environmental monitoring.