Blockchain technology for robot swarms: A shared knowledge and reputation management system for collective estimation.
This repository contains the code for the paper:
V.Strobel, M. Dorigo. 2018. Blockchain technology for robot swarms: A shared knowledge and reputation management system for collective estimation.
Submitted to ANTS 2018 -- Eleventh International Conference on Swarm Intelligence.
A pre-print is available at:
http://iridia.ulb.ac.be/IridiaTrSeries/
In this work, we demonstrate how a blockchain can be used as shared knowledge medium, computing platform, and reputation management system in robot swarms. We show that a swarm of robots can collectively determine the relative frequency of environmental features via blockchain-based smart contracts (decentralized protocols executed via blockchain technology). Consensus in the swarm is achieved in a fully decentralized way without the need of an external observer. Via the presented reputation management system residing on the blockchain, the impact of malfunctioning robots (Byzantine robots) can be managed. We conducted three experiments using a robot swarm simulator, showing (i) the feasibility of the approach, (ii) the trade-off between blockchain size and accuracy, and (iii) the suitability of the blockchain as a reputation management system.
