Use of RSSI for motion control of wirelessly networked robot swarm

Abstract

For a wirelessly networked robot swarm, to accomplish a unified task as a group, it is necessary to generate a set of common coordinates among all member robots and to notify each member robot of its heading direction in the generated common coordinates. However, when the member robots are not equipped with sensors to identify their locations or bearings, they can use only a function in the wireless communication protocol to network them as a tool to generate a set of common coordinates among them. This paper outlines a set of common coordinates and a heading direction generation method for a wirelessly networked robot swarm with RSSI (Received Signal Strength Indicator, namely, received power) measured through wireless communications and shows experimental results on the location and heading direction estimation errors in indoor and outdoor environments.