Modelling Cities as a collection of TeraSystems - Computational challenges in Multi-Agent Approach

Abstract

Agent-based modeling techniques are ideal for modeling massive complex systems such as insect colonies or biological cellular systems and even cities. However these models themselves are extremely complex to code, test, simulate and analyze. This paper discusses the challenges in using agent-based models to model complete cities as a complex system. In this paper we argue that Cities are actually a collection of various complex models which are themselves massive multiple systems, each of millions of agents, working together to form one system consisting of an order of a billion agents of different types - such as people, communities and technologies interacting together. Because of the agent numbers and complexity challenges, the present day hardware architectures are unable to cope with the simulations and processing of these models. To accommodate these issues, this paper proposes a Tera (to denote the order of millions)-modeling framework, which utilizes current technologies of Cloud computing and Big data processing, for modeling a city, by allowing infinite resources and complex interactions. This paper also lays the case for bringing together research communities for interdisciplinary research to build a complete reliable model of a city.