Environment-driven distributed evolutionary adaptation in a population of autonomous robotic agents

Bredeche, Nicolas; Montanier, Jean Marc; Liu, Wenguo; Winfield, Alan F.T.

Abstract

This article is concerned with a fixed-size population of autonomous agents facing unknown, possibly changing, environments. The motivation is to design an embodied evolutionary algorithm that can cope with the implicit fitness function hidden in the environment so as to provide adaptation in the long run at the level of population. The proposed algorithm, termed mEDEA, is shown to be both efficient in unknown environments and robust to abrupt and unpredicted changes in the environment. The emergence of consensus towards specific behavioural strategies is examined, with a particular focus on algorithmic stability. Finally, a real-world implementation of the algorithm is described with a population of 20 real-world e-puck robots. © 2012 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: Feb 1, 2012
• Journal: Mathematical and Computer Modelling of Dynamical Systems
• Print ISSN: 1387-3954
• Electronic ISSN: 1744-5051
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 18
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 101-129
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13873954.2011.601425
• Keywords: evolutionary robotics, artificial life, open-ended evolution, swarm intelligence
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/960286
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/13873954.2011.601425