A Multi-Agent System Simulating Crew Interaction in a Military Aircraft

The development of expert systems using parallel machines is a practice in its infancy, but its future is very promising. Researchers at the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory of the C.M.R. de Saint-Jean have been able to implement a cooperative system in which relatively independent agents cooperate to solve a specific problem. The system presented is implemented on a distributed memory parallel machine, enabling several autonomous expert systems executing simultaneously, to work together. This approach is part of a strategy to solve complex problems via a multi-agent distributed system. The problem dealt with--to simulate crew interaction in an anti-submarine aircraft--enabled us to demonstrate the many advantages to be gained, in a large number of applications, from the presented choice of software and hardware architecture. The long-term objective of this project is to provide a more productive and economical way of training crews of this aircraft.