The proposed Phase II-Extended effort will further develop and demonstrate an innovative approach to perform real-time relative vehicle localization within a swarm formation with application to communication-less coordination. These objectives are achieved by using Random Finite Sets statistics theory to solve the multiple object tracking problem. The swarm formation localization problem can be formulated as estimating the local intensity function of targets in the near field and developing probabilistic control strategies to track an expected localization state space configuration. Phase II-Extended work will focus on refining estimation and control algorithms that operate the swarm within regions with fixed boundaries, so that the agents are aware of features within the region as well as the region limitations. These concepts equally support small numbered teams and large-element swarms, and can operate during the normal birth and death rates anticipated for homogenous and heterogeneous swarms. Phase I and Phase II portion of this program have produced an operational SWARM Toolset that implements the Random Finite Set statistics theory in a user friendly multi-agent simulation environment. For Phase II-Extended, Tennant Company will be an external contributor. Three major tasks are proposed for this Phase II-Extended development of swarming space vehicle estimation and control. These are further broken down for sub-tasks specific to Tennant Company Indoor Swarming Vehicles, NASA Roving and Orbiting Swarming Vehicles, and Integrated Enhancement of the SWARM Toolset. Algorithms developed and analyzed in Phase I and Phase II will specifically be extended to the environmental models and swarm vehicle dynamics for the unique Tennant Company and NASA applications that incorporate bounded operational areas. Demonstrations of the benefits of the technology will be presented in software simulations.

NASA applications for this Phase II-Extended consist of enabling autonomous precision swarm coordination for roving vehicles on a planetary surface or orbiting spacecraft, which are confined to operate within a user-defined region or envelope. The system offers precise spacecraft formation flying in the solar system, with limited mission control intervention after primary objectives are defined. The system benefits asteroid and comet exploration, Earth and planetary body orbiting swarms, and unmanned inspection of spacecraft.

Increased coordination and control for multiple unmanned vehicles operating within confined regions; commercial and industrial settings. Remote sensing systems for outdoors; agronomy and geological surveying applications. Search and rescue operations, disaster relief within structural limits or geographical zones. Tracking and localizing for medical-based concepts, such as embedded medical agents.