Task Allocation and Coordination for Limited Capability Mobile Robots

In multi-robot systems, predefined task allocation and coordination may not always work as desired. This is due to the inability to entirely model all aspects of the robot’s interactions with the environment before task execution. Robots with limited capabilities also present the challenge of how their limited resources should be utilised to achieve the objectives of the global task. This paper presents a task allocation and coordination strategy for mobile robots with limited capabilities. To determine task-robot combinations, task allocation utilises a VOTS that represent a robot’s suitability for a task. Task allocation yields a team of robots comprising task managers and task executers. After task allocation, task executer robots execute the global task, while task manager robots monitor the performance of the global task. If the global task’s performance is not optimal, the task executer robots’ resource utilisation is varied using a feedback coordination mechanism. The task allocation and coordination strategy is applied to a multi-robot map building task and preliminary results are presented.