Design Patterns for Evolutionary Robotics
Abstract:
The construction of controllers for robots performing simple tasks in wellknown and well-structured environments is reasonably well understood, and well established theories and communities exist. On the other hand, construction of controllers for robots placed in dynamic and unstructured environments can be very challenging, and no good general methodologies exist. Often, finding good solutions relies on the experience and intuition of the system engineer. Evolutionary robotics offers an approach to automate this process. However, designing an evolutionary robotic system is a non-trivial process, that requires perhaps even more experience and intuition than designing the controller itself. The development of a toolbox in the form of a design pattern language might significantly reduce the problems related to designing such a system. In this paper, four design patterns regarding evolutionary robotics is presented that could become part of design pattern language for evolutionary robotics. The four presented patterns focus on the principles and dynamics of evolutioanry robotics, rather than on implementation aspects. The first pattern can be regarded as a context for the subsequent three patterns.
