Control and Coordination of Multiple Biomimetic Robotic Fish

Investigation in biomimetic robotic fish is a multidisciplinary area entirely integrating hydrodynamics-based control and robotic technology. In this brief, grounded on an optimized kinematic and dynamic model of robotic fish which synthesizes both the carangiform and anguilliform swimming modes, a free-swimming, multilink robotic fish and its motion control are designed. Employing top-down design approach, we propose a hierarchical architecture for an artificial multifish system which consists of five levels: task level, role level, behavior level, action level, and controller level, to formalize the processes from task decomposition, role assignments, and control performance. A vision-based, closed-loop experimental system for multiple robotic fish is finally constructed to verify the proposed architecture. The running experiments of fish versus man primarily show that much greater capabilities are exhibited when the fish try to cooperate with each other