Robust Multi-Robot Cooperation Using an Idiotypic Model of Artificial Immune Systems

The human immune system is a network of cells, tissues, and other organs that defend the body against foreign invaders called antigens. Jerne’s Idiotypic network theory concerns how an antibody in the immune system stimulates or suppresses another antibody and recognizes an antigen. Based on the principles of the human immune system and Jerne’s idiotypic network theory this paper presents a method for cooperation among robots in a multi-robot system. The developed cooperative multi-robot system is fully autonomous and distributed. In the present paper, cooperation is not assumed a priori. If a robot is unable to complete a task alone, the system autonomously chooses the appropriate number of suitable and most capable robots in the fleet to cooperate with each other in carrying out a global task. The approach developed in the paper incorporates robustness and fault tolerance in immune system–based multi-robot cooperation.Copyright © 2010 by ASME