Design and Simulation of Multi-robot Logistic System

Abstract

Modern Logistic automation systems need the ability to cooperatively execute some complicated tasks in an efficient way. In order to meet this requirement, a kind of cooperative multi-robot logistic system based on agent is proposed, and the distributed multi-agent architecture for such intelligent production system is designed. The architecture consists of information agent, object agent, decision-making agent, cooperative agent, executive agent, monitor agent and interface agent in network environment, which can guarantee high efficiency and convenient expansibility. The generalized stochastic petri net model of multi-agent logistic system is established to exhibit the inherent dynamic characteristics. In addition, task cooperation of multi-agent logistic system is discussed, and some details including formal description, algorithm, behaviour rules and agent realization are given. According to the provided architecture and algorithm, one small cooperative logistic system is developed. Simulation result shows that agent-based method is helpful to develop the intelligent multi-robot logistic system.