duobin / drones-swarm

Adaptive exploration of a UAVs swarm for distributed targets detection and tracking

SCIADRO: adaptive exploration of a UAVs swarm for distributed targets detection and tracking

This research focuses on the problem of coordinating multiple UAVs for distributed targets detection and tracking, in different technological and environmental settings. The proposed approach is founded on the concept of swarm behavior in multi-agent systems, i.e., a self-formed and self-coordinated team of UAVs which adapts itself to mission-specific environmental layouts. The swarm formation and coordination are inspired by biological mechanisms of flocking and stigmergy, respectively. These mechanisms, suitably combined, make it possible to strike the right balance between global search (exploration) and local search (exploitation) in the environment. The swarm adaptation is based on an evolutionary algorithm with the objective of maximizing the number of tracked targets during a mission or minimizing the time for target discovery. The simulation testbed publicly released.

Cite as "M.G.C.A. Cimino, M. Monaco, P. Piscione, A.L. Alfeo, Sciadro simulator, 2018. https://github.com/mlpi-unipi/drones-swarm."

Publications

1. M. Avvenuti, M.G.C.A. Cimino, G. Cola, G. Vaglini, "Detection and mapping of a toxic cloud using UAVs and emergent techniques", in Proc. MIKE The Sixth International Conference on Mining Intelligence and Knowledge Exploration (MIKE 2018), Vol -, pp. 1-10, Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 20-22 December, 2018.
2. A.L. Alfeo, M.G.C.A. Cimino, N. De Francesco, A. Lazzeri, M. Lega, G. Vaglini, "Swarm coordination of mini-UAVs for target search using imperfect sensors", Intelligent Decision Technologies, IOS Press, Vol. 12, Issue 2, Pages 149-162, 2018.
3. A.L. Alfeo, M.G.C.A. Cimino, N. De Francesco, M. Lega, G. Vaglini, "Design and simulation of the emergent behavior of small drones swarming for distributed target localization", Journal of Computational Science, Elsevier Science, Vol. 29, Pages 19-33, 2018.
4. M.G.C.A. Cimino, A. Lazzeri, G. Vaglini, "Using Differential Evolution to Improve Pheromone-based Coordination of Swarms of Drones for Collaborative Target Detection", in Proc. INSTICC The 5th International Conference on Pattern Recognition Applications and Methods (ICPRAM 2016), pp. 605-610, Rome, Italy, 2016.
5. M.G.C.A. Cimino, A. Lazzeri, G. Vaglini "Combining stigmergic and flocking behaviors to coordinate swarms of drones performing target search", in Proc. IEEE The Sixth International Conference on Information, Intelligence, Systems and Applications (IISA 2015), pp. 1-6, Corfu, Greece, pp.1-6, 6-8 July 2015.