The dynamics of confusion and consensus in cooperative multi-agent control systems
Event details
| Date | 19.10.2012 |
| Hour | 11:15 › 12:00 |
| Speaker | Roy Smith (Automatic Control Lab, ETH Zurich) |
| Location |
ME C2 405
|
| Category | Conferences - Seminars |
Interest in the dynamics of coordinated and cooperative systems has grown significantly in recent years. Such systems appear in many disciplines; biology (synchronized firefly displays, flocking and schooling behavior), operations management (decentralized dynamic task assignment), environmental science (mobile environmental sensors), aeronautics (autonomous aerial vehicle formations) and computer science (distributed computing consensus) are just a few examples.
The focus of this work is high-performance cooperative control and the motivating application is the distributed control of deep-space interferometric imaging formations. Architectures for high performance distributed control require overlapping information and estimation structures. These in turn lead to issues of confusion and consensus when agents estimate each others behavior in the attempt to achieve a common goal. This confusion can exhibit its own dynamics, which if not managed, degrades the overall system performance. Controlling confusion requires communication amongst the agents, leading to minimum communication requirements in high performance cooperative systems. Methods for the design of distributed estimators, using both local measurements and lossy communication channels have been developed to address these problems.
Biography:
Roy Smith's Ph.D. is from Caltech, Pasadena, in 1990, after which he joined the faculty at the University of California, Santa Barbara. In January 2011 he moved to ETH Zurich. He has held visiting Professor positions at UC Berkeley, Indian Institute of Science, Cambridge University, and KTH Stockholm.
Roy Smith's research interests are in the areas of: modeling and identification, robust, model predictive and coordinated control. He has developed and applied theory to a variety of experimental testbeds including: process control, automotive engine systems, flexible space structures, aeromanoeuvring Mars entry vehicles, formation flying of spacecraft, magnetically levitated bearings, semiconductor growth, and building energy/thermal management. He has been a long time consultant to the Jet Propulsion laboratory on guidance, navigation and control aspects of interplanetary and deep-space science spacecraft.
The focus of this work is high-performance cooperative control and the motivating application is the distributed control of deep-space interferometric imaging formations. Architectures for high performance distributed control require overlapping information and estimation structures. These in turn lead to issues of confusion and consensus when agents estimate each others behavior in the attempt to achieve a common goal. This confusion can exhibit its own dynamics, which if not managed, degrades the overall system performance. Controlling confusion requires communication amongst the agents, leading to minimum communication requirements in high performance cooperative systems. Methods for the design of distributed estimators, using both local measurements and lossy communication channels have been developed to address these problems.
Biography:
Roy Smith's Ph.D. is from Caltech, Pasadena, in 1990, after which he joined the faculty at the University of California, Santa Barbara. In January 2011 he moved to ETH Zurich. He has held visiting Professor positions at UC Berkeley, Indian Institute of Science, Cambridge University, and KTH Stockholm.
Roy Smith's research interests are in the areas of: modeling and identification, robust, model predictive and coordinated control. He has developed and applied theory to a variety of experimental testbeds including: process control, automotive engine systems, flexible space structures, aeromanoeuvring Mars entry vehicles, formation flying of spacecraft, magnetically levitated bearings, semiconductor growth, and building energy/thermal management. He has been a long time consultant to the Jet Propulsion laboratory on guidance, navigation and control aspects of interplanetary and deep-space science spacecraft.
Practical information
- General public
- Free
Organizer
- Colin Jones
Contact
- Colin Jones ([email protected])