Modeling Role-Based Agent Team1

The problem of ensuring agents work as an effective team in dynamic distributed environments still remains a challenging issue. In this paper we proposed a role-based team model. In our model, the role characterizes the responsibilities and provides logic patterns to achieve certain goals and cooperate with others. The agent is an autonomous execution unit and follows the logic patterns that the role provides. We also developed algorithms and mechanisms to evolve the plan of a role to the plan of an agent. Our role-based team model allows the split of roles (who define the plans) and agents (who execute the plans) in team plans, and dynamic role-agent assignment. It also achieves a certain level of plan reusability. We present two experiments which show plan reusability and its flexibility in supporting simultaneously plan invocation.