Unmanned Systems Collaboration Model Researched

Unmanned Systems Collaboration Model Researched

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The Georgia Tech Research Institute has developed Collaborative Unmanned Systems Technology Demonstrator (CUSTD) – an unmanned systems platform for performing collaborative autonomy research. The primary research aim of this platform is to explore algorithms for controlling multiple unmanned systems vehicles.

The system consists of multiple small, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and an Unmanned Ground Vehicle (UGV) that can operate autonomously and accept missions from a ground station. The system leverages off-the-shelf technologies and open standards, such as JAUS, and can be configured to carry different scientific payloads.

Different agents may carry different sensor payloads or have different capabilities, to make them better suited for different roles and tasks. In real world scenarios, it is useful for agents to collaborate with each other to perform dynamic task allocation for a given mission. The CUSTD platform is used to perform such collaborative, heterogeneous and autonomous missions. The vehicles can send messages over the communications links to each other and negotiate task assignments in a distributed fashion.

According to the Institute’s website, the system architecture allows for ease of payload configuration and algorithm development. The vehicles carry multiple sensors and payloads and can relay data to each other or to the open source FalconView based ground station. Using the ground station, operators can track each vehicle simultaneously and view sensor information from these systems in real-time.