# A Survey on Swarm Robotics for Area Coverage Problem
## 6 Applications for Swarm Robotics to Perform Area Coverage Tasks  
There is a comprehensive application of swarm robots due to the increased reliability in adopting new technology in research and analysis over large open spaces and terrains to achieve area coverage. Swarm robots are increasingly used in various fields, such as the military, archaeology, and oil sectors. Today, geologists can visually represent the earth's surface using three-dimensional imaging, using swarm robots. The result is the reduced cost of operations because it can take several hours to map a large area, which initially requires several days or weeks. In the military sector, the swarm application is used in intelligence collection. The military deploys a swarm of UAVs in various parts of the world to conduct reconnaissance simultaneously. Such capability provides the military with updated data and information that enhances readiness and the ability to respond to threats [94]. In the oil sector, swarm robots estimate the level and depth of oil spillage. Initially, it would take two-to-three weeks for oil companies to assess the scope of damage when oil spilt in the open seas. Today, oil companies are deploying swarm drones to assess damage from oil spills and suitable effective methods to be used to control the damage. Overall, there is continuous development and research in swarm robots that seek to enhance the integration and application of robots to enhance the quality of life [95]. There are many applications of swarm robotics for area coverage:  
According to [96], the low-cost robots were applied for sustainable broad-acre agriculture to increase production and decrease the environmental impact. These robots were controlled and run by a centralised laptop. The project focuses on using robotics to deal with resistant weeds, a critical problem for Australian farmers. The used robots have low-cost cameras and positioning sensors to achieve a large-scale area coverage task while avoiding other robots and obstacles. Experimental results were obtained from one real Robot and 12 simulated robots cooperating and having a 3G mobile data connection for 2 h on a 55-hectare field in Emerald, Australia. Through implementation, the real robot \"sprayed\" 6 hectares, missing 2.6% and overlapping 9.7% within its assigned field partition, and successfully avoided three obstacles. Ref. [34] claims that five robots with an XBee module presented the problem of seeking electromagnetic sources by area coverage by implementing many modified PSO algorithms on mobile robots according to the physical constraints presented by both robots and the environment. The area covered is 5 \(\times\) 5 m\({}^{2}\), and applying the Vicon tracking system gives the information of the robot's precise position with the support of an indoor GPS system used to recognise markers on the robots. The type of robots used with an XBee module in experiments improved from the Parallax Shield-Bot, which Arduino controls. These robots search for the target source, a module of XBee hanging above a floor at a height of 20 cm in the middle of the area to avoid the probability of collision with the robot. Also, the avoidance strategies for static and dynamic obstacles occurred in PSO in this experiment. In the investigation of [97], many swarm robotics were used to achieve area coverage in a known environment by applying a new proposed cooperative strategy for spraying in a large field while using the local information of robots. Spraying is distributing Plant Protection Products (PPPs) on the crop at various stages in the cultivation process. To cover an area divided by the proposed strategy into regions, there must be a guarantee that each area will be visited only once by the robot. In the simulation experiment, 50-to-250 tracks exist in the field; the distance between the two ways is 20 cm, and the track length is 20 m. The dimensions of the robot used are 50 cm, and all robots have the same velocity of 0.5 (m/s). Ref.