Cooperation between underwater vehicles

Abstract

The underwater environment intensifies difficulties inherent in cooperation between autonomous vehicles by dramatically reducing their ability to communicate with each other. Lack of communication drives the need for decentralized control which in turn requires a shared view of the tasks and their status as the mission progresses. Decision-making, especially task allocation, requires low-bandwidth mechanisms for negotiation and achieving consensus. Strategies to obtain this low-bandwidth decision-making and control rely on both the availability of significant a priori information about the mission and tasks and careful design of the system.