An Empirical Evaluation of Communication and Coordination Effectiveness in Autonomous Reactive Multiagent Systems

This thesis describes experiments designed to measure the effect of collaborative communication on task performance of a multiagent system. A discrete event simulation was developed to model a multi-agent system completing a task to find and collect food resources, with the ability to substitute various communication and coordination methods. Experiments were conducted to find the effects of the various communication methods on completion of the task to find and harvest the food resources. Results show that communication decreases the time required to complete the task. However, all communication methods do not fare equally well. In particular, results indicate that the communication model of the bee is a particularly effective method of agent communication and collaboration. Furthermore, results indicate that direct communication with additional information content provides better completion results. Cost-benefit models show some conflicting information, indicating that the increased performance may not offset the additional cost of achieving that performance.

Grantor dc:publisher

University of North Texas

Year dc:date

2005

Author dc:creator

• Hurt, David

Contributors dc:contributor

• Tarau, Paul
• Mikler, Armin R.
• Mihalcea, Rada, 1974-

• Intelligent agents (Computer software)
• food resources
• multiagent systems
• coordination
• simulation
• multi-agent system

Statement dc:rights

• Public
• Copyright
• Hurt, David
• Copyright is held by the author, unless otherwise noted. All rights reserved.

Language dc:language

English

Identifier

oclc: 62145033
https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc4770/
ark: ark:/67531/metadc4770

OAI identifier oai:identifier

info:ark/67531/metadc4770