ArCOOR

ArCOOR is a framework and open standard designed to enable cooperative perception and coordinated action among autonomous agents, including robots and unmanned aerial vehicles. The name ArCOOR stands for Autonomous Robotic Coordination and Object Recognition. The project aims to provide a common ontology, messaging protocol, and reference implementations to facilitate interoperability across diverse platforms and domains.

The core components include a data ontology that defines shared representations for agents, tasks, perception results, and environmental objects; a real-time communication layer based on lightweight messages (JSON/Protobuf) with quality-of-service options; a coordination layer that supports task assignment, planning, and convoy or formation control; and a perception layer that supports multi-sensor data fusion and object recognition outputs. The framework emphasizes decoupled modules and plug-in adapters for different sensors and hardware stacks.

History and status: Initiated by an international consortium of universities and industry partners in 2018, ArCOOR released its first public specification in 2020. The current widespread release is version 1.3 (2024). It is maintained by the ArCOOR Consortium with community governance and ongoing enhancements, including security hardening and privacy controls.

Applications and impact: Intended for search-and-rescue, industrial automation, logistics, and disaster response, ArCOOR aims to improve coordination in multi-agent operations and accelerate interoperability across ecosystems. Adoption remains selective and codebases vary by region and sector; ongoing pilots assess performance in dynamic environments.

See also: ROS, DDS, OPC UA, Multi-Agent Systems, Sensor fusion.