Safe and Secure Control of Swarms of Vehicles by Small-World Theory

Nicola Roveri, Antonio Carcaterra, Leonardo Molinari and Gianluca Pepe
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Nicola Roveri: Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00184 Rome, Italy
Antonio Carcaterra: Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00184 Rome, Italy
Leonardo Molinari: Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00184 Rome, Italy
Gianluca Pepe: Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Sapienza University of Rome, 00184 Rome, Italy

Energies, 2020, vol. 13, issue 5, 1-28

Abstract: The present paper investigates a new paradigm to control a swarm of moving individual vehicles, based on the introduction of a few random long-range communications in a queue dominated by short-range car-following dynamics. The theoretical approach adapts the small-world theory, originally proposed in social sciences, to the investigation of these networks. It is shown that the controlled system exhibits properties of higher synchronization and robustness with respect to communication failures. The considered application to a vehicle swarm shows how safety and security of the related traffic dynamics are strongly increased, diminishing the collision probability even in the presence of a hacker attack to some connectivity channels.

Keywords: autonomous vehicle; platoon control; swarm behavior; small world theory; complex networks (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
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