Re-embodiment of Honeybee Aggregation Behavior in an Artificial Micro-Robotic System

In this article we describe the re-embodiment of biological aggregation behavior of honeybees in Jasmine micro-robots. The observed insect behavior, in the context of the insect’s sensor–actor system, is formalized as behavioral and motion-sensing meta-models. These meta-models are transformed into a sensor–actor system of micro-robots by means of a sensors virtualization technique. This allows us to keep the efficiency and scalability of the bio-inspired approach. We also demonstrate the systematic character of this re-embodiment procedure on collective aggregation in a real robotic swarm.