A significant challenge in control theory and technology is to devise agile
and less resource-intensive experiments for evaluating the performance and
feasibility of control algorithms for the collective coordination of
large-scale complex systems. Many new methodologies are based on macroscopic
representations of the emerging system behavior, and can be easily validated
only through numerical simulations, because of the inherent hurdle of
developing full scale experimental platforms. In this paper, we introduce a
novel hybrid mixed reality set-up for testing swarm robotics techniques,
focusing on the collective motion of robotic swarms. This hybrid apparatus
combines both real differential drive robots and virtual agents to create a
heterogeneous swarm of tunable size. We validate the methodology by extending
to higher dimensions, and investigating experimentally, continuification-based
control methods for swarms. Our study demonstrates the versatility and
effectiveness of the platform for conducting large-scale swarm robotics
experiments. Also, it contributes new theoretical insights into control
algorithms exploiting continuification approaches