Logic-Based Modeling of Information Transfer in Cyber-Physical Multi-Agent Systems

Abstract. In modeling multi-agent systems, the structure of their com-munication is typically one of the most important aspects, especially for systems that strive toward self-organization or collaborative adaptation. Traditionally, such structures have often been described using logic-based approaches as they provide a formal foundation formany verificationmeth-ods. However, these formalisms are typically not well suited to reflect the stochastic nature of communication in a cyber-physical setting. In partic-ular, their level of abstraction is either too high to provide sufficient accu-racy or too low to be practicable in more complex models. Therefore, we propose an extension of the logic-basedmodeling language SALMA,which we have introduced recently, that provides adequate high-level constructs for communication and data propagation, explicitly taking into account stochastic delays and errors. In combination with SALMA’s tool support for simulation and statisticalmodel checking, this creates a pragmatic app-roach for verification and validation of cyber-physicalmulti-agent systems