Quantum Cooperative Robotics and Autonomy
This work addresses the problem of improving autonomy and security in cooperative robotics for engineering applications, but appears incremental as it applies existing quantum methods to classical robotic systems.
This paper explores integrating quantum technologies like entanglement and cryptography into distributed robotic platforms to enhance autonomy in cooperative multi-agent systems, though no concrete performance numbers are provided.
The intersection of Quantum Technologies and Robotics Autonomy is explored in the present paper. The two areas are brought together in establishing an interdisciplinary interface that contributes to advancing the field of system autonomy, and pushes the engineering boundaries beyond the existing techniques. The present research adopts the experimental aspects of quantum entanglement and quantum cryptography, and integrates these established quantum capabilities into distributed robotic platforms, to explore the possibility of achieving increased autonomy for the control of multi-agent robotic systems engaged in cooperative tasks. Experimental quantum capabilities are realized by producing single photons (using spontaneous parametric down-conversion process), polarization of photons, detecting vertical and horizontal polarizations, and single photon detecting/counting. Specifically, such quantum aspects are implemented on network of classical agents, i.e., classical aerial and ground robots/unmanned systems. With respect to classical systems for robotic applications, leveraging quantum technology is expected to lead to guaranteed security, very fast control and communication, and unparalleled quantum capabilities such as entanglement and quantum superposition that will enable novel applications.