A formal approach to self-configurable swarm-based space-exploration systems

Abstract

Intelligent swarms draw their inspiration from biology where many simple entities act independently, but when grouped, they appear to be highly organized. NASA is currently investigating swarm-based technologies for the development of prospective exploration missions to explore regions of space where a single large spacecraft would be impractical. The main emphasis of this research is to develop algorithms and prototyping models for self-managing swarm-based space-exploration systems. This article presents our work on formally modeling self-configuring behavior in such systems. We present a formal model for team formation based on Partially Observable Markov Decision Processes and Discrete Time Markov Chains along with formal models for planning and scheduling.