Integration of an Autonomous Artificial Agent in an Insect Society: Experimental Validation (original) (raw)
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Self-amplification processes are at the origin of several collective decision phenomena in insect societies. Understanding these processes requires linking individual behavioral rules of insects to a choice dynamics at the colony level. In a homogeneous environment, the German cockroach Blattella germanica displays self-amplified aggregation behavior. In a heterogeneous environment where several shelters are present, groups of cockroaches collectively select one of them. In this article, we demonstrate that the restriction of the self-amplified aggregation behavior to distinct zones in the environment can explain the emergence of a collective decision at the level of the group. This hypothesis is tested with robotics experiments and dedicated computer simulations. We show that the collective decision is influenced by the available spaces to explore and to aggregate in, by the size of the population involved in the aggregation process and by the probability of encounter zones while the robots explore the environment. We finally discuss these results from both a biological and a robotics point of view.
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In group-living animals, aggregation favours interactions and information exchanges between individuals, and thus allows the emergence of complex collective behaviors. In previous works, a model of a self-enhanced aggregation was deduced from experiments with the cockroach Blattella germanica. In the present work, this model was implemented in micro-robots Alice and successfully reproduced the agregation dynamics observed in a group of cockroaches. We showed that this aggregation process, based on a small set of simple behavioral rules of interaction, can be used by the group of robots to select collectively an aggregation site among two identical or different shelters. Moreover, we showed that the aggregation mechanism allows the robots as a group to "estimate" the size of each shelter during the collective decision-making process, a capacity which is not explicitly coded at the individual level.
Self-Organized Aggregation Triggers Collective Decision Making in a Group of Cockroach-Like Robots
Adaptive Behavior, 2009
Self-amplification processes are at the origin of several collective decision phenomena in insect societies. Understanding these processes requires linking individual behavioral rules of insects to a choice dynamics at the colony level. In a homogeneous environment, the German cockroach Blattella germanica displays self-amplified aggregation behavior. In a heterogeneous environment where several shelters are present, groups of cockroaches collectively select one of them. In this article, we demonstrate that the restriction of the self-amplified aggregation behavior to distinct zones in the environment can explain the emergence of a collective decision at the level of the group. This hypothesis is tested with robotics experiments and dedicated computer simulations. We show that the collective decision is influenced by the available spaces to explore and to aggregate in, by the size of the population involved in the aggregation process and by the probability of encounter zones while t...
Collective decision-making by a group of cockroach-like robots
2005
In group-living animals, aggregation favours interactions as well as information exchanges between individuals, and allows thus the emergence of complex collective behaviors. In previous works, a model of a self-enhanced aggregation was deduced from experiments with the cockroach Blattella germanica. In this work, this model was implemented in micro-robots Alice and successfully reproduced the agregation dynamics observed in a group of cockroaches. We showed that this aggregation process, based on a small set of simple behavioral rules and interactions among individuals, can be used by the group of robots to select collectively an aggregation site among two identical or different shelters. Moreover, we showed that the aggregation mechanism allows the robots as a group to "estimate" the size of each shelter during the collective decision-making process, a capacity which is not explicitly coded at the individual level but that simply emerges from the aggregation behaviour.
The Embodiment of Cockroach Aggregation Behavior in a Group of Micro-robots
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We report the faithful reproduction of the self-organized aggregation behavior of the German cockroach Blattella germanica with a group of robots. We describe the implementation of the biological model provided by Jeanson et al. in Alice robots, and we compare the behaviors of the cockroaches and the robots using the same experimental and analytical methodology. We show that the aggregation behavior of the German cockroach was successfully transferred to the Alice robot despite strong differences between robots and animals at the perceptual, actuatorial, and computational levels. This article highlights some of the major constraints one may encounter during such a work and proposes general principles to ensure that the behavioral model is accurately transferred to the artificial agents.
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Collective Decision-Making Based on Individual Discrimination Capability in Pre-social Insects
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Gregarious insects, like cockroaches, aggregate in shelters during their resting period. How do individuals reach a collegial decision? What is the relation between the distributions of the individuals and the parameter values characterizing the population and the environment? With a model based on experimental data, we demonstrated that the collegial decision is based on the relation between the individual resting time in a shelter and the population in this shelter. We extended this model to the case where different sub-groups may interact and where the crowding effect under the shelters influences the aggregation. This second model shows that depending on the interaction between the sub-groups and the crowding effect, different patterns are observed such as segregation of the different sub-group or the aggregation of the whole population.
Collegial decision making based on social amplification and their control by artificial agents
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In mixed societies of robots and cockroaches, several insect-likerobot (Insbot) and animals interact in order to perform collective decisionmaking. Many gregarious species are able to collectively select a resting site without any leadership. The key process is based on the modulation of the probability of leaving the shelter according to the total population under this shelter and its light intensity. It is important that cockroaches perceive the robot as a "congener". This recognition is mainly based on a chemical blend. The aim of this study is to validate experimentally (1) the behavioral patterns expressed by the cockroaches in presence of shelters and of an Insbot, and (2) the important role played by the chemical blend on collective decisionmakings.