A scalable and distributed model for self-organization and self-healing

As the ability to produce a large number of small, simple robotic agents improves, it becomes essential to control the behavior of these agents in such a way that the sum of their actions gives rise to the desired overall result. These agents are modeled as homogeneous, distributed robots, with only one simple short range sensor. Our simple agents are tasked to form and hold a desired swarm shape, independent of the total number of agents. If this shape is damaged by the removal of some of the agents, the remaining agents will recover the former shape, but on a smaller scale. These shapes can also have a pattern such as a picture or drawing displayed on them by controlling the individual robots color, symbolically representing the differentiation of agents within the swarm. This pattern will resize to fit the existing swarm. With the ability to synchronize in time, the swarm gains the ability to change the pattern displayed, resulting in a moving image.