Simulation and Visualization of a large scale Real Time Multi-Robot system

This paper describes the software implementation and the visualization aspects of an interaction-communication protocol within a large scalable multi-robot system. It investigates the current communication protocols within multi-agent systems and the feasibility to transfer them into a virtual environment system that performs a specified task intelligently, embedding human capability into the control system software. The proposed system allows dynamic changes, i.e. the user may be able to continuously issue commands, or modify tasks. The work presented exploits the Virtual Environment Centre VEC. The semi-immersive full scale environment within the VEC allows the user to better understand the robots' behaviour and in turn test whether they simulate the expected behaviour. The use of a semi-immersive full-scale environment also gives an increased level of presence enabling the user to believe they are within their own simulation. It also presents a prototype for a robot automatic fire extinguishing system as a test application area.