Scalable Task Allocation with Communications Connectivity for Flying Ad-Hoc Networks

Abstract

Task allocation enables heterogeneous agents to execute heterogeneous tasks in the domain of unmanned aerial vehicles, while responding to dynamic changes in the environment and available resources to complete complex, multi-objective missions, leading to swarm intelligence. We propose a bio-inspired approach using digital pheromones to perform scalable task allocation when the number of agents, tasks, and the diameter of the communications graph increase. The resulting emergent behaviour also enables idle agents in the swarm to provide periodic or continuous connectivity between disconnected parts of the swarm. We validate our results through simulation and demonstrate the feasibility of our approach by applying it to the 3D coverage and patrol problem.