Multi-Agent Image Classification via Reinforcement Learning

We investigate a classification problem using multiple mobile agents that are capable of collecting (partial) pose-dependent observations of an unknown environment. The objective is to classify an image (e.g, map of a large area) over a finite time horizon. We propose a network architecture on how agents should form a local belief, take local actions, extract relevant features and specification from their raw partial observations. Agents are allowed to exchange information with their neighboring agents and run a decentralized consensus protocol to update their own beliefs. It is shown how reinforcement learning techniques can be utilized to achieve decentralized implementation of the classification problem. Our experimental results on MNIST handwritten digit dataset demonstrates the effectiveness of our proposed framework.