Title: A Survey on Blockchain Technology and Its Potential Applications in Distributed Control and Cooperative Robots,
Abstract: As a disruptive technology, blockchain, particularly its original form of
bitcoin as a type of digital currency, has attracted great attentions. The
innovative distributed decision making and security mechanism lay the technical
foundation for its success, making us consider to penetrate the power of
blockchain technology to distributed control and cooperative robotics, in which
the distributed and secure mechanism is also highly demanded. Actually,
security and distributed communication have long been unsolved problems in the
field of distributed control and cooperative robotics. It has been reported on
the network failure and intruder attacks of distributed control and
multi-robotic systems. Blockchain technology provides promise to remedy this
situation thoroughly. This work is intended to create a global picture of
blockchain technology on its working principle and key elements in the language
of control and robotics, to provide a shortcut for beginners to step into this
research field.