May 28, 2015CoCoRo underwater mini-robots school like fish and share knowledge

A group of "Lily" CoCoRo robots communicate with one another using their LEDs (Credit: CORDIS)

Starting in April 2011, the European Union CoCoRo (Collective Cognitive Robots) research consortium has been developing three varieties of autonomous underwater robots that school together like fish. By doing so, the little bots can share and learn from each others' "knowledge" of their environment, acting as a collective cognitive system that's smarter than any one of its individual parts.

The robots communicate with one another via built-in flashing LEDs, using onboard electronics such as computer vision systems, compasses and accelerometers to find their way around aquatic environments.

Utilizing an algorithm inspired by the clustering behavior of bees (not fish!), they can seek out others of their kind and then settle together around one central base location, becoming aware of the growing size of their group as more robots arrive. Individuals can then leave that cluster to go on their own missions, subsequently returning to share their findings with the group.

In one experiment, groups of two types of the robots – "Jeff" robots and "Lily" robots – were put in a pool to locate a simulated crashed airplane (actually a group of magnets, used to simulate the plane's electro-magnetic field). While the Lily robots patrolled the surface, the Jeffs went deeper.

Once one of the Jeff robots located the magnets, it used its LEDs to signal the other Jeffs, which responded by gathering around it over the "wreckage." The Lily robots observed this behavior from above, and responded by forming a cluster on the surface in the same location.

The robots have also been tested in the open ocean in Italy, where they reportedly were able to cluster and patrol despite the waves, currents and corrosive salt water.

Although the CoCoRo project wrapped up last September, the researchers are just now beginning to publicize the results. It is hoped that the technology could ultimately find its way into autonomous schooling aquatic robots used for ecological monitoring, reconnaissance, or other applications.

Some of the robots can be seen in action, in the video below.

Source: CORDIS

CoCoRo水下迷你机器人群像鱼一样可共享数据

COCORO水下微型机器人的学校像鱼和分享知识5月28日，2015CoCoRo水下微型机器人的学校像鱼和共享knowledge

A组的“百合”COCORO机器人相互使用他们的LED（CORDIS信用）进行通信2011年4月，欧盟COCORO（集体认知机器人）研究团体已经发展三个品种的自治水下机器人，一起上学像鱼。通过这样做，这个小机器人可以共享，并从他们的环境的彼此的“知识”学习，作为一个集体认知系统，它比它的各个部分的任何一个聪明。

机器人彼此经由通信内置闪烁的LED灯，在飞机上使用电子设备，如计算机视觉系统，指南针和加速计来找到自己的周围水环境的方法。

利用一种算法灵感来自蜜蜂的集群行为（不是鱼！），他们可以寻求他人的那种和那么解决共同围绕一个中心基地的位置，成为意识到自己组的规模不断扩大，为更多的机器人到达。那么个人可以离开该集群去对自己的任务，随后返回到同组分享他们的发现

在一个实验中，两种类型的机器人的群体 - “杰夫”机器人和“莉莉”的机器人 - 被放在池来定位一个模拟飞机坠毁（实际上是一组磁体，用于模拟飞机的电 - 磁场）。虽然莉莉机器人巡逻从表面上看，杰夫斯去更深。

一旦找到了磁铁的杰夫机器人之一，它用它的LED信号其它杰夫斯，它的反应是聚集在其周围过来的“残骸”。百合机器人观察到上述这种行为，并作出反应，在相同的位置在表面形成一个集群。

机器人也已经在开放的海洋在意大利，据说在那里他们能够聚集和巡逻尽管波测试，电流和腐蚀性的海水。

虽然COCORO项目结束了去年9月，研究人员刚刚开始公布结果。希望该技术最终会找到自己的方式到用于生态监测，侦察，或其他应用程序自治区教育水产机器人

有的机器人可以看出，在行动，在下面的视频

来源：CORDIS