Auction based Task Reallocation in Multiagent Systems

Task allocation is a key problem in multiagent systems. The importance of automated negotiation protocols for solving the task allocation problem is increasing as a consequence of increased multi-agent applications. In this paper, we introduce the multiagent Traveling Salesman Problem(TSP) as an example of task reallocation problem, and suggest Vickery auction as an inter-agent coordination mechanism for solving this problem. In order to apply this market-based coordination mechanism into multiagent TSPs, we define the profit of each agent, the ultimate goal of negotiation, cities to be traded out through auctions, the bidding strategy, and the order of auctions. The primary advantage of such approach is that it can find an optimal task allocation ...