A distributed autonomous control architecture for synchronization and coordination of multiple robot systems

This paper deals with modeling and implementation problems in multiple robot control systems, especially in the field of flexible manufacturing systems. Based on conceptual condition-event models of robotic activities, extended Petri nets are adopted as a tool for expressing independent and cooperative robotic tasks by industrial intelligent robots. Net models representing inter-robot cooperation with synchronized interaction are presented, and the design of a net based real-time distributed control system which coordinates the parallel activities of the robot controllers through the transmission of commands and the reception of status, is described.