A swarm robotic approach to distributed object pushing using fuzzy controllers

This research is an attempt to design and develop behaviors for a group of robots to handle an object. A new approach to develop an object pushing system with a large group of mobile robots is introduced. The behaviors are devised in such a way that the robots would easily develop a swarm formation around the object and push it toward the desired goal. A rotating orbit of robots around the object is developed first, and the object is moved toward the goal as the orbit moves to the desired goal configuration. Using a simple decision making, each robot can easily determine its proper action to push the object while remaining in the robot formation. Fuzzy controllers are used to develop behaviors in each robot. In this method, each robot performs individually in the system without a need to any information about other robots in the system. The main characteristics of the developed system are independency of the method to the object kinematics and its shape. Moreover, the method is not dependent on the number of robots in the system. Simulation results are given to support the proposed approach.