Abstract
ReactiveBuild is an algorithm that enables robot swarms to build a variety of robust, amorphous, and environment-adaptive structures without pre-planning. Robots form structures by climbing their peers until either reaching a point closest to a goal location or until a neighboring robot recruits it for structural reinforcement. This contrasts with typical approaches to robotic self-assembly which generally seek to form some a priori, latticed shape. This paper demonstrates a simulated swarm of FireAnt3D robots using ReactiveBuild to form towers, chains, cantilevers, and bridges in three-dimensional environments.
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Acknowledgement
We thank Orion Kafka and Newell Moser for their help in strengthening the portions of this paper related to solid mechanics, and Thomas Bochynek for his help in strengthening the portions of this paper related to biology.
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Swissler, P., Rubenstein, M. (2022). ReactiveBuild: Environment-Adaptive Self-Assembly of Amorphous Structures. In: Matsuno, F., Azuma, Si., Yamamoto, M. (eds) Distributed Autonomous Robotic Systems. DARS 2021. Springer Proceedings in Advanced Robotics, vol 22. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-92790-5_28
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-92790-5_28
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