| Multi-agent systems (MASs) are characterized by collections of autonomous agents that interact with each other in simple ways, but the collection of agents as a whole is characterized by emergent behavior (EB) which will have properties that individual agents do not.; Engineers want to design artificial MASs for a variety of reasons including military operations. The idea is for the EB to be carrying out the mission itself. In this scenario, the agents are relatively inexpensive and expendable. A large body of work exists in MAS research for military applications and a variety of different designs have been proposed.; Because there is no uniform framework for communicating quantitative research results dealing with agent cooperation, it is difficult for engineers to make well-informed design decisions. We demonstrate an example of how to qualitatively and more importantly, quantitatively compare two approaches to agent cooperation. The example includes a formal experiment design and data analysis. Our example MAS deals with cooperative suppression of enemy air defense (C-SEAD). We consider two approaches to agent cooperation: state-based and Artificial Physics (AP). In this case, our example indicates that the state-based approach is better. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)... |
