Multi-agent system for dynamic scheduling

Abstract

This paper proposes a flexible manufacturing system based on intelligent computational agents. A Multi-Agent System composed of 4 types of reactive agents was designed to control the operation of a real implementation in the Intelligent Automation Lab at Instituto Superior Tecnico. This implementation was ´ based and constructed analogously to a known benchmark, AIPPRIMECA. The agents were modelled using Petri nets and agent communications were defined through the combination of FIPA Interaction Protocols. The system was tested under the conditions of static and dynamic scenarios, having its performance validated whenever possible by comparison with results from a Potential Fields Approach in the same benchmark. Overall, the performance exhibited by the proposed MAS was slightly better and it is worth highlighting the simple behaviour of each agent and ability to respond in real-time to all the dynamic scenarios tested.