Design and Simulation of a Wave-like Self-Organization Strategy for Resource-Flow Systems

In resource-flow systems, e.g. production lines, agents are processing resources by applying capabilities to them in a given order. Such systems profit from self-organization as they become easier to manage and more robust against failures. This paper proposes a decentralized coordination process that restores a system’s functionality after a failure by propagating information about the error through the system until a fitting agent is found that is able to perform the required function. The mechanism has been designed by combining a top-down design approach for self-organizing resource-flow system and a systemic modeling approach for the design of decentralized, distributed coordination mechanisms. The systematic conception of the interagent process is demonstrated. Evaluations of convergence as well as performance are performed by simulations.