C O N T E N T S
1 i n t r o d u c t i o n 13
1 . 1 Original contributions 15
1 . 2 Other contributions not related to this thesis 16 1 . 3 Thesis layout 20
2 t h e d e s i g n p r o b l e m 23 2 . 1 Swarm systems 23
2 . 2 Engineering swarm systems 25 2 . 2 . 1 Micro to macro 26 2 . 2 . 2 Macro to micro 29
2 . 2 . 3 Discussion of engineering methods for swarm sys- tems 32
3 d e s i g n pat t e r n s a s a n e n g i n e e r i n g m e t h o d o l o g y f o r d e c e n t r a l i s e d s y s t e m s 35
3 . 1 A catalogue of reusable solutions 36 3 . 2 The design pattern and its attributes 37 3 . 3 How to build a design pattern 38
4 t o wa r d s t h e f o r m a l i s at i o n o f a d e s i g n pat t e r n f o r d e c e n t r a l i s e d d e c i s i o n m a k i n g 41
4 . 1 From macroscopic descriptions to implementation guide- lines 42
4 . 1 . 1 The macroscopic model 43 4 . 1 . 2 Implementation guidelines 44
4 . 2 Case study: shortest path discovery/selection 47 4 . 2 . 1 Problem definition 48
4 . 2 . 2 Implementation of abstract multiagent simula- tions 49
4 . 2 . 3 Implementation of physics-based swarm robotics simu- lations 55
4 . 3 Results 58
4 . 3 . 1 Abstract multiagent simulations 58
4 . 3 . 2 Physics-based swarm robotics simulations 64 4 . 4 Discussion 68
5 a d e s i g n pat t e r n f o r d e c e n t r a l i s e d d e c i s i o n m a k - i n g 71
5 . 1 Name 71
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10 Contents