The blockchain: a new framework for robotic swarm systems

By Eduardo Castelló Ferrer. Future Technologies Conference, 2016

307 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Swarms of robots will revolutionize many industrial applications, from targeted material delivery to precision farming. However, several of the heterogeneous characteristics that make them ideal for certain future applications --- robot autonomy, decentralized control, collective emergent behavior, etc. --- hinder the evolution of the technology from academic institutions to real-world problems. Blockchain, an emerging technology originated in the Bitcoin field, demonstrates that by combining peer-to-peer networks with cryptographic algorithms a group of agents can reach an agreement on a particular state of affairs and record that agreement without the need for a controlling authority. The combination of blockchain with other distributed systems, such as robotic swarm systems, can provide the necessary capabilities to make robotic swarm operations more secure, autonomous, flexible and even profitable. This work explains how blockchain technology can provide innovative solutions to four emergent issues in the swarm robotics research field. New security, decision making, behavior differentiation and business models for swarm robotic systems are described by providing case scenarios and examples. Finally, limitations and possible future problems that arise from the combination of these two technologies are described.

Subfields: Computer Networks and Communications, Control and Systems Engineering, Information Systems

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/9543fc3670c251bc57c5bcccd9aed332bcec8aba

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Citations in the corpus

Distributed Blockchain-Based Data Protection Framework for Modern Power Systems Against Cyber Attacks (2019, methodology): “The application of blockchain in robotic swarm system was studied by Ferrer [37], in which global knowledge is maintained within the swarm.”
Survey on 6G Frontiers: Trends, Applications, Requirements, Technologies and Future Research (2021, background): “Attacks performed by malicious UAVs, which attempt to enter into UAV swarm networks can be mitigated using blockchain to protect networks against either intruders or spoofing attempts [254].”
The Rise of Blockchain Technology in Agriculture and Food Supply Chains (2019, unknown): “Blockchain could even be used to make agricultural robotic swarm operations more secure, autonomous and flexible (Ferrer 2018).”
Blockchain for AI: Review and Open Research Challenges (2019, background): “This hash will represent the exact content of the document and can be encoded into the decentralized network without the document’s content being exposed [35], [44].”
Blockchain in Industries: A Survey (2019, background): “add security, autonomy, and flexibility features [32].”
Toward Blockchain-Based Accounting and Assurance (2017, background): “These technologies together represent the technical foundation of future commerce (Omohundro 2014; Deloitte 2016; Dorri, Kanhere, and Jurdak 2016; Ferrer 2016).”
Digital Twin in the IoT Context: A Survey on Technical Features, Scenarios, and Architectural Models (2020, background): “A part of the research efforts is tackling new and interesting topics such as how to determine an “agreement” between agents [87], how to assess the trustworthiness of these systems [88], and how to create transactional capabilities [89].”
A Survey on Smart Agriculture: Development Modes, Technologies, and Security and Privacy Challenges (2021, methodology): “Ferrer [24] Blockchain Swarm robotic systems for precision”