Abstract
In this paper we present a general design methodology suitable for a class of complex multi-agent systems which are capable of self-assembly. Our methodology is based on a top-down, bottom-up approach, which has the potential to achieve a range of global design goals whilst retaining emergent behaviour somewhere in the system, and thereby allowing access to a richer solution space. Our experimental environment is a software system to model 2-dimensional self-assembly of groups of autonomous agents, where agents are defined as square smart blocks. The general design goal for such systems is to direct the self-assembly process to produce a specified structure. The potential of this design methodology has been realised by demonstrating its application to a “toy” problem – the self-assembly of rectangles of different sizes and shapes in a two-dimensional mesoblock environment. The design procedure shows different choices available for decomposing a system goal into subsidiary goals, as well as the steps needed to ensure a match to what is achievable from the bottom-up process. Encouraging results have been obtained, which allows mesoblock rectangles of specified size to be assembled in a directed fashion. Two different approaches to the same problem were presented, showing the flexibility of the method.
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Poulton, G., Guo, Y., James, G., Valencia, P., Gerasimov, V., Li, J. (2005). Directed Self-assembly of 2-Dimensional Mesoblocks Using Top-Down/Bottom-Up Design. In: Brueckner, S.A., Di Marzo Serugendo, G., Karageorgos, A., Nagpal, R. (eds) Engineering Self-Organising Systems. ESOA 2004. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 3464. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/11494676_10
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/11494676_10
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-26180-3
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