School of Science and Technology

Course Syllabus

General aims for second cycle education

Second-cycle courses and study programmes shall involve the acquisition of specialist knowledge, competence and skills in relation to first-cycle courses and study programmes, and in addition to the requirements for first-cycle courses and study programmes shall
- further develop the ability of students to integrate and make autonomous use of their knowledge
- develop the students' ability to deal with complex phenomena, issues and situations, and
- develop the students' potential for professional activities that demand considerable autonomy, or for research and development work.

(Higher Education Act, Chapter 1, Section 9)

Knowledge and understanding
Completing this course, the student shall be able to
- explain formalisms, methods and algorithms for planning and scheduling which are presented in the course and identify their underlying assumptions,
- explain basic concepts in multi-agent systems,
- discuss methods for how individual agents and multi-agent systems are constructed, and
- account for different forms of distributed decision making.

Applied knowledge and skills
Completing this course, the student shall be able to
- identify real-world situations and problems which can be formulated as task planning, motion planning and scheduling problems,
- sketch solutions to solve the above problems which use heuristic search, constraint-based techniques and sampling-based methods, and
- develop and review software for solving complex distributed problems with multi-agent system techniques.

Judgments and approach
Completing this course, the student shall be able to
- choose the most appropriate approach among the several presented during the course for solving a specific problem,
- understand the computational and representational trade-offs associated with methods for planning, scheduling, and multi-robot systems.

The course consists of two compulsory sub-courses.

Part I: Planning & Scheduling, 7.5 credits
- State-space and plan-space planning problems and representations,
- planning and search,
- Graphplan, planning as satisfiability,
- constraint-based resource scheduling,
- decision-theoretic planning, and
- motion planning.

Part II: Multi-Agent Systems, 7.5 credits
- Introduction to multi-agent systems,
- agent architectures,
- task allocation and result sharing,
- distributed decision making,
- multi-agent planning, and
- applications of multi-agent systems.

Part I: Planning & Scheduling
Teaching is given in the form of lectures, lab assignments, and seminars.

Part II: Multi-Agent Systems
Teaching is given in the form of lectures as well as theoretical and practical assignments.

In case of a small number of students, the lectures may be replaced by individual tutoring.

Students who have been admitted to and registered on a course have the right to receive tuition and/or supervision for the duration of the time period specified for the particular course to which they were accepted (see, the university's admission regulations (in Swedish)). After that, the right to receive tuition and/or supervision expires.

For further information, see the university's local examination regulations (in Swedish).

According to the Higher Education Ordinance, Chapter 6, Section 18, a grade is to be awarded on the completion of a course, unless otherwise prescribed by the university. The university may prescribe which grading system shall apply. The grade is to be determined by a teacher specifically appointed by the university (an examiner).

According to regulations on grading systems for first- and second-cycle education (vice-chancellor's decision 2010-10-19, reg. no. CF 12-540/2010), one of the following grades is to be used: fail, pass, or pass with distinction. The vice-chancellor or a person appointed by the vice-chancellor may decide on exceptions from this provision for a specific course, if there are special reasons.

Grades used on course are Fail (U), Pass (G) or Pass with Distinction (VG).

To receive the grade VG for the entire course, the student must have VG on both theory parts.

For further information, see the university's local examination regulations (in Swedish).

At least 30 credits from Computer Engineering, Research methodologies for Intelligent Systems, Second Cycle, 30 Credits and Computer Science, Advanced Technologies for Intelligent Systems, Second Cycle, 15 Credits.

For further information, see the university's admission regulations (in Swedish).

Students who have previously completed higher education or other activities are, in accordance with the Higher Education Ordinance, entitled to have these credited towards the current programme, providing that the previous studies or activities meet certain criteria.

For further information, see the university's local credit transfer regulations (in Swedish).

The course is given in English.


Reading List and Other Teaching Materials

Part 1: Required Reading

Ytterligare material kan utdelas under kursens gång.
Additional material may be awarded during the course.

See this Course Syllabus as PDF