Intelligent agents are entities that can perform tasks in a somewhat autonomous way. Multi-agent systems use collections of agents working together towards a common goal. Some applications of agents are information retrieval, intelligent remote control, intelligent highways, Internet searching, software simulations, Robocup, RoboRescue, Quidditch, and others. During the semester we will explore issues about agents such as theoretical foundations, planning, communication, error recovery, learning, design, knowledge representation, desicion making, and programming.
Students will be expected to both do research on general aspects of multi-agent systems, and also to program multi-agent systems. While the BREVE artificial life system and a collection offiles with partially implemented multi-user systems will be made available, students can program in any programming language of their choice. Students can also work on any programming project, after receiving my OK. Ample time will be provided during class hours to polish and troubleshoot our systems.
End of semester evaluations will be based on the semester-long projects we will work on, as well as participation in theoretical discussions.The following schedule should help you in preparing for the different topics we will be talking about during this semester. We will all enjoy and get more out of the course if you do the suggested readings before coming to class.
I encourage you to take advantage of the syllabus shown below
in order
to remain on schedule.
| Week | Dates | Topics |
| 1 | Feb. 1, 3 | Course outline. Office hours, evaluations, etc. Are you ready for this course? Introduction to the course. What is an agent? What's a multi-agent system? What are some of the issues? What are some of the applications? |
| 2 | Feb. 8,10 | goals, subgoals, and ontologies. |
| 3 | Feb. 15, 17 | goals, subgoals, and ontologies. |
| 4 | Feb. 24 | Neural Networks (NN). |
| 5 | Mar. 1, 3 | Neural Networks Neurally controlled agents Integration of NN & symbolic processing. |
| 6 | Mar. 8, 10 | Induction of Decision Trees. |
| 7 | Mar. 15, 17 | Evolution of agents. |
| 8 | Mar. 29, 31 | Knowledge representation |
| 9 | Apr. 5, 7 | Clear statement of projects due. |
| 10 | Apr. 12, 14 | |
| 11 | Apr. 19, 21 | Initial project reports |
| 12 | Apr. 26, 28 | Project debugging and refinement |
| 13 | May 3, 5 | Final presentations |