Local Communication Protocols for Learning Complex Swarm Behaviors with Deep Reinforcement Learning

Swarm systems constitute a challenging problem for reinforcement learning (RL) as the algorithm needs to learn decentralized control policies that can cope with limited local sensing and communication abilities of the agents. While it is often difficult to directly define the behavior of the agents, simple communication protocols can be defined more easily using prior knowledge about the given task. In this paper, we propose a number of simple communication protocols that can be exploited by deep reinforcement learning to find decentralized control policies in a multi-robot swarm environment. The protocols are based on histograms that encode the local neighborhood relations of the agents and can also transmit task-specific information, such as the shortest distance and direction to a desired target. In our framework, we use an adaptation of Trust Region Policy Optimization to learn complex collaborative tasks, such as formation building and building a communication link. We evaluate our findings in a simulated 2D-physics environment, and compare the implications of different communication protocols.Comment: 13 pages, 4 figures, version 2, accepted at ANTS 201

Cooperative object transport with a swarm of e-puck robots: robustness and scalability of evolved collective strategies

Cooperative object transport in distributed multi-robot systems requires the coordination and synchronisation of pushing/pulling forces by a group of autonomous robots in order to transport items that cannot be transported by a single agent. The results of this study show that fairly robust and scalable collective transport strategies can be generated by robots equipped with a relatively simple sensory apparatus (i.e. no force sensors and no devices for direct communication). In the experiments described in this paper, homogeneous groups of physical e-puck robots are required to coordinate and synchronise their actions in order to transport a heavy rectangular cuboid object as far as possible from its starting position to an arbitrary direction. The robots are controlled by dynamic neural networks synthesised using evolutionary computation techniques. The best evolved controller demonstrates an effective group transport strategy that is robust to variability in the physical characteristics of the object (i.e. object mass and size of the longest object’s side) and scalable to different group sizes. To run these experiments, we designed, built, and mounted on the robots a new sensor that returns the agents’ displacement on a 2D plane. The study shows that the feedback generated by the robots’ sensors relative to the object’s movement is sufficient to allow the robots to coordinate their efforts and to sustain the transports for an extended period of time. By extensively analysing successful behavioural strategies, we illustrate the nature of the operational mechanisms underpinning the coordination and synchronisation of actions during group transport

HE-LHC: The High-Energy Large Hadron Collider – Future Circular Collider Conceptual Design Report Volume 4

In response to the 2013 Update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics (EPPSU), the Future Circular Collider (FCC) study was launched as a world-wide international collaboration hosted by CERN. The FCC study covered an energy-frontier hadron collider (FCC-hh), a highest-luminosity high-energy lepton collider (FCC-ee), the corresponding 100 km tunnel infrastructure, as well as the physics opportunities of these two colliders, and a high-energy LHC, based on FCC-hh technology. This document constitutes the third volume of the FCC Conceptual Design Report, devoted to the hadron collider FCC-hh. It summarizes the FCC-hh physics discovery opportunities, presents the FCC-hh accelerator design, performance reach, and staged operation plan, discusses the underlying technologies, the civil engineering and technical infrastructure, and also sketches a possible implementation. Combining ingredients from the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the high-luminosity LHC upgrade and adding novel technologies and approaches, the FCC-hh design aims at significantly extending the energy frontier to 100 TeV. Its unprecedented centre-of-mass collision energy will make the FCC-hh a unique instrument to explore physics beyond the Standard Model, offering great direct sensitivity to new physics and discoveries

COMPRESSIVE SPLIT-STEP FOURIER METHOD

In this paper an approach for decreasing the computational effort required for the split-step Fourier method (SSFM) is introduced. It is shown that using the sparsity property of the simulated signals, the compressive sampling algorithm can be used as a very efficient tool for the split-step spectral simulations of various phenomena which can be modeled by using differential equations. The proposed method depends on the idea of using a smaller number of spectral components compared to the classical split-step Fourier method with a high number of components. After performing the time integration with a smaller number of spectral components and using the compressive sampling technique with l1 minimization, it is shown that the sparse signal can be reconstructed with a significantly better efficiency compared to the classical split-step Fourier method. Proposed method can be named as compressive split-step Fourier method (CSSFM). For testing of the proposed method the Nonlinear Schr¨odinger Equation and its one-soliton and two-soliton solutions are considered.In this paper an approach for decreasing the computational effort required for the split-step Fourier method (SSFM) is introduced. It is shown that using the sparsity property of the simulated signals, the compressive sampling algorithm can be used as a very efficient tool for the split-step spectral simulations of various phenomena which can be modeled by using differential equations. The proposed method depends on the idea of using a smaller number of spectral components compared to the classical split-step Fourier method with a high number of components. After performing the time integration with a smaller number of spectral components and using the compressive sampling technique with l1 minimization, it is shown that the sparse signal can be reconstructed with a significantly better efficiency compared to the classical split-step Fourier method. Proposed method can be named as compressive split-step Fourier method (CSSFM). For testing of the proposed method the Nonlinear Schr¨odinger Equation and its one-soliton and two-soliton solutions are considered

ANALYTICAL AND NUMERICAL ASPECTS OF THE DISSIPATIVE NONLINEAR SCHR ¨ ODINGER EQUATION

In this paper various analytical and numerical aspects of the dissipativenonlinear Schr¨odinger equation (d-NLS equation) are discussed. Decaying solitary wavetype solutions derived by Demiray is reviewed and a new approximate solitary wavetype solution of the d-NLS equation is introduced in order to make comparisons. Also asplit-step Fourier scheme is proposed for numerical solution of the d-NLS equation andthe analytical solutions are compared with the numerical results.In this paper various analytical and numerical aspects of the dissipativenonlinear Schr¨odinger equation (d-NLS equation) are discussed. Decaying solitary wavetype solutions derived by Demiray is reviewed and a new approximate solitary wavetype solution of the d-NLS equation is introduced in order to make comparisons. Also asplit-step Fourier scheme is proposed for numerical solution of the d-NLS equation andthe analytical solutions are compared with the numerical results

A note on the cylindrical solitary waves in an electron-acoustic plasma with vortex electron distribution

In the present work, we consider the propagation of nonlinear electron-acoustic non-planar waves in a plasma composed of a cold electron fluid, hot electrons obeying a trapped/vortex-like distribution, and stationary ions. The basic nonlinear equations of the above described plasma are re-examined in the cylindrical coordinates through the use reductive perturbation method in the long-wave approximation. The modified cylindrical Korteweg-de Vries equation with fractional power nonlinearity is obtained as the evolution equation. Due to the nature of nonlinearity, which is fractional, this evolution equation cannot be reduced to the conventional Korteweg-de Vries equation. An analytical solution to the evolution equation, by use of the method developed by Demiray [Appl. Math. Comput. 132, 643 (2002); Comput. Math. Appl. 60, 1747 (2010)] and a numerical solution by employing a spectral scheme are presented and the results are depicted in a figure. The numerical results reveal that both solutions are in good agreement.Publisher's Versio

Rogue waves of the Kundu-Eckhaus equation in a chaotic wave field

In this paper we study the properties of the chaotic wave fields generated in the frame of the Kundu-Eckhaus equation (KEE). Modulation instability results in a chaotic wave field which exhibits small-scale filaments with a free propagation constant, k. The average velocity of the filaments is approximately given by the average group velocity calculated from the dispersion relation for the plane-wave solution however direction of propagation is controlled by the $\beta$ parameter, the constant in front of the Raman-effect term. We have also calculated the probabilities of the rogue wave occurrence for various values of propagation constant k and showed that the probability of rogue wave occurrence depends on k. Additionally, we have showed that the probability of rogue wave occurrence significantly depends on the quintic and the Raman-effect nonlinear terms of the KEE. Statistical comparisons between the KEE and the cubic nonlinear Schrodinger equation have also been presented