REAGERE: A reaction-based architecture for integration and control

This research is concerned with the design, development and implementation of a unique reaction-based multi-agent architecture (REAGERE) to integrate and control a manufacturing domain, by combining concepts from distributed problem solving and multi-agent systems. This architecture represents an emerging concept of reifying the parts, equipment, and software packages of the domain as individual agent entities. This research also improves on earlier top- down automated manufacturing systems, that suffered from lack of flexibility, upgradability, overhead difficulties, and performance problems when presented with the uncertainty and dynamics of modern competitive environments. The versatility of the domain is enhanced with the independent development of the agents and the object-oriented events that permit the agents to communicate through the underlying blackboard architecture BB1. This bottom-up concept permits the architecture's integration to rely on the agents' interactions and their perceptions of the current environmental problem(s). Hence the control and coordination of the architecture are adaptable to the agents' reactions to dynamic situations. REAGERE was applied to a simulated predefined automated manufacturing domain for the purpose of controlling and coordinating the internal processes of this domain.