Cognitive Particles

Cognitive Particles is a step toward realizing the ability to develop autonomous components (particles) that are capable of coordinating to come together and form a desired object. Automated shape assembly and disassembly from a collection of particles would allow incredible resource availability and flexibility in domains ranging from the highly specialized and time-critical (soldiers in the field or medical technicians in the operating room) to the more mundane. In this work, we first developed theoretical concepts supporting the development and coordination of autonomous shape-forming particles. Building on this foundation, we constructed a 3-dimensional particle simulation testbed to enable experimentation regarding hypotheses about the processes and structures required for automated shape assembly.
The original document contains color images.