Retired Robots

The Ants: A Community of Microrobots

In order to accomplish these goals, the robots have been equipped with sensors and actuators designed with their natural counterparts in mind. Each robot has 17 sensors including; four light sensors, four IR (infrared) receivers, bump sensors, food sensors, and a tilt sensor. They communicate with each other using two IR emitters, one mounted on the front of the robot and one mounted on the top.

There are several levels of social behavior before reaching the goal of the ant colony. Right now, the robots can play Follow the Leader, Tag and Manhunt. Manhunt is similar to tag except there are two teams. The final game before the full-fledged Ant Farm is Capture the Flag.

There are many application for robotic communities, including explosive ordnance disposal, and Mars exploration. All the pictures on these pages are clickable to get a full-screen image.

Hardware:

It sure would be nice if I could click on the picture and find out what each part does...

Ant Hardware Map

Exactly how much does one of these things weigh?

Technical Specs

Do you have any more pictures? And how did you build these things? And what do they look like when they move? And...

More Info What's the natural habitat for microrobots?

The Ant Farm



Software

Ok, so now we know all about the hardware. But how do you make a small collection of parts intelligent?

Antware (Software for Ants)

So you turn them on and they do their thing. How do you get them to act like a community of robots?

The Evolution of Antware

Hmmm... Interesting. Any results?

Social Behavior



More Information

Ya know, I think I read something about this. Has this project been in the papers?

The Ants in the Media

I'm tired of reading all this stuff! Can I just look at the pictures?

The Ant Photo Album

I want to read more! Are there any papers?

Ant Papers



Related Research at the MIT AI Lab:

Related Research Elsewhere:

Related Web Sites: