Modeling of UAS Swarms Using Dynamic and Re-Configurable Software Architecture

The decentralized operation of a UAS swarm in mission-critical systems would have significant advantages over the centralized operation of a single UAS with respect to system-wide quality attributes. The design of UAS swarms demands close attention to the system-wide qualities such as reliability, availability, performance, and adaptability. Software architecture of a system has shown to play an important role in the realization of these qualities. In this paper, three important control architectures for UAS swarms systems are evaluated according to the system-wide quality attributes such as reliability, availability, performance, and adaptability. The digital pheromone control architecture is selected as an optimal solution satisfying the above criteria. More specifically, the three-tier architectural style provides a context in which quality attributes such as reliability, availability, performance, and adaptability are realized. The proposed three-tier software architecture is then specified in the Darwin architecture description language.