A physicomimetics control framework for swarms of Autonomous Surface Vehicles

Teams of autonomous cooperating vehicles are well-suited for meeting the challenges associated with mobile marine sensor networks. Swarms built using a physicomimetics approach exhibit predictable behavior - an important benefit for extended duration deployments of autonomous ocean platforms. By using a decentralized control framework, we minimize energy consumption via short-range communication and self-contained on-board data processing, all without a specified leader. We introduce the task of autonomous surface vehicle (ASV) navigation inside a bioluminescent plume to motivate future study of how the agility and scalability of our physics-based solution can benefit a mobile distributed sensor network.