Efficient environment management for distributed simulation of large-scale situated multi-agent systems

摘要

Multi-agent systems have been proven very effective for the modelling and simulation (M&S) of complexrnsystems like those related to biology, engineering, social sciences and so forth. The intrinsic spatial characterrnof many such systems leads to the definition of a situated agent. A situated agent owns spatial coordinatesrnand acts and interacts with its peers in a hosting territory. In the context of parallel/distributed simulation ofrnsituated agent models, the territory represents a huge shared variable that requires careful handling. Frequentrnaccess by agents to territory information easily becomes a bottleneck degrading system performance andrnscalability. This paper proposes an original approach to modelling and distributed simulation of large-scalernsituated multi-agent systems. Time management is exploited for resolving conflicts and achieving datarnconsistency while accessing the environment. The approach allows a simplification of the M&S tasks byrnmaking the modeller unaware of distribution concerns while ensuring the achievement of good scalabilityrnand performance during the distributed simulation. Practical aspects of the approach are demonstratedrnthrough some modelling examples based on Tileworld.