Project Overview

Autonomous machines offer great potential for applications in construction, agriculture, and disaster response. However, their collaboration is hampered by a lack of interoperability between different manufacturers, software architectures, and communication interfaces. The IMARO research project aims to develop cross-vendor middleware that spontaneously and securely networks autonomous machines of different designs into a cooperative overall system. The goal is to enable new robots to be integrated into existing autonomous work processes without extensive individual customization.

Research Objectives

The project focuses on the following research areas:

• Cross-manufacturer interoperability: Development of standardized interfaces for communication between different autonomous robot systems.
• Evaluation of Autonomy Capabilities: Development of models and metrics for describing and objectively evaluating autonomous machines.
• Self-adaptive system integration: Development of mechanisms for the dynamic reconfiguration and situation-dependent adaptation of autonomous systems.
• Cooperative robot systems: Ad hoc networking of heterogeneous autonomous machines and investigation of their collaboration within a robot swarm.

Technological Approach

Development is based on the existing robotics middleware FINROC. To this end, concepts for interoperability, capability description, service negotiation, and dynamic reconfiguration are investigated and implemented. Existing frameworks and communication standards are taken into account to support interoperability between different system components and frameworks.

Validation and Demonstration

The developed concepts will be tested in realistic application scenarios. To this end, autonomous machines with different hardware and software architectures will be networked with one another, and their collaboration will be examined. Evaluation will be based on defined metrics for the middleware’s performance, reliability, scalability, and practical suitability, as well as for the performance of the robot swarm.

Project Information

Project Duration: November 1, 2025 – October 31, 2028

Partnering Company:Robot Makers GmbH

Funding Application: InnoProm