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SARL is a general-purpose agent-oriented programming language. This language aims at providing the fundamental abstractions for dealing with concurrency, distribution, interaction, decentralization, reactivity, autonomy and dynamic reconfiguration that are usually considered as essential for implementing agent-based applications. Every programming language specifies an execution model. For SARL, this run-time model is supported by a SARL run-time environment. The goals of this paper are to highlight the key principles for creating a SARL run-time environment, and its concrete implementation into the Janus agent platform. Fil: Galland, Stéphane. Universite de Bourgogne; Francia Fil: Rodriguez, Sebastian Alberto. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Tucumán; Argentina. Universidad Tecnológica Nacional; Argentina Fil: Gaud, Nicolas. Universite de Bourgogne; Francia

Multiagent-based simulations enable us to validate different use-case scenarios in a lot of application domains. The idea is to develop a realistic virtual environment to test particular domain-specific procedures. This paper presents a multilevel model of a physic environment for the simulation of crowd in a virtual 3D building. The major contributions of this paper is the agentification of the model to support multilevel simulation of the environment. Finally, the application of the model inside an airport terminal is presented.

Carpooling is an emerging alternative transportation mode that is eco-friendly and sustainable as it enables commuters to save time, travel resource, reduce emission and traffic congestion. The procedure of carpooling consists of a number of steps namely; (i) create a motive to carpool, (ii) communicate this motive with other agents, (iii) negotiate a plan with the interested agents, (iv) execute the agreed plans, and (v) provide a feedback to all concerned agents. The state-of-the-art research work on agent-based modeling is limited to a number of technical and empirical studies that are unable to handle the complex agent behavior in terms of coordination, communication and negotiations. In this paper, we present a conceptual design of an agent-based model (ABM) for the carpooling a that serves as a proof of concept. Our model for the carpooling application is a computational model that is used for simulating the interactions of autonomous agents and to analyze the effects of change in factors related to the infrastructure, behavior and cost. In our carpooling application, we use agent profiles and social networks to initiate our agent communication model and then employ a route matching algorithm, and a utility function to trigger the negotiation process between agents. We plan to, as a part of the future work, develop a prototype of our agent-based carpooling application based on the work presented in this paper. Furthermore, we also intend to carry out a validation study of our results with real data.

In order to commute by carpooling, individuals need to communicate, negotiate and coordinate, and in most cases adapt their daily schedule to enable cooperation. Through negotiation, agents (individuals) can reach complex agreements in an iterative way, which meets the criteria for the successful negotiation. The procedure of negotiation and trip execution in the long-term carpooling consists of a number of steps namely; (i) decision to carpool, (ii) exploration and communication, (iii) negotiation, (iv) coordination and schedule adaptation, (v) long term trip execution (carpooling), (vi) negotiation during carpooling and (vii) carpool termination and exploration for new carpool. This paper presents a conceptual design of an agent-based model (ABM) of a set of candidate carpoolers. A proof of concept implementation is presented. The proposed model is used for simulating the interactions between autonomous agents. The model enables communication to trigger the negotiation process; it measures the effect of pick-drop and shopping activities on the carpooling trips. Carpooling for commuting is simulated: we consider a set of two intermediate trips (home-to-work and work-to-home) for the long-term carpooling. Schedule adaptation during negotiation depends on personal preferences. Trip timing and duration are crucial factors. We carried out a validation study of our results with real data (partial) collected in Flanders, Belgium. Simulation results show the effect of constraining activities on the carpooling trips. The future research will mainly focus on enhancing the mechanisms for communication and negotiation between agents.

In the carpooling, individuals need to communicate, negotiate and in most cases adapt their daily schedule to enable cooperation. Through negotiation, agents (individuals) can reach complex agreements in an iterative way which meet the criteria for successful negotiation. The result of the negotiation depends on “negotiation mechanism” used to match and on the behavior of the agents involved in the negotiation process. This paper presents an organizational and agent-based model for commuting by candidate carpoolers using a simple negotiation mechanism aimed at finding an acceptable agreement between agents to carpool. Initially, the agents involved in exploration process, search for their partners via some kind of Agent Communication Language (ACL); after finding potential partners, they start a negotiation to find matched partner to carpool. After having found a good match, the agents can carpool for a specified time period. The agents join the carpool group when the negotiation is successful and leave the carpool group when the agreed time period is expired. Agents can be part of several carpool groups sequentially. The first implementation used home and work locations as well as preferred trip start times and carpool periods determined by uniformly sampling given sets. Furthermore a simplistic negotiation mechanism used roughly to produce possible results for the synthetic data. An automated negotiation model is implemented and validated through simulation. The Janus multi-agent platform is used. Future research will mainly focus on the development of behaviorally sound negotiation mechanism. Hussain, I (reprint author), Hasselt Univ, Transportat Res Inst IMOB, Wetenschapspk 5 Bus 6, B-3590 Diepenbeek, Belgium. iftikhar.hussain@uhasselt.be