Multiagent systems are distributed systems in which a number of individual autonomous heterogeneous agents operate and interact in an environment. Agents can be physical (computers or robots) or logical (software) entities. One of the classical applications of the multiagent ideas was in distributed sensing and monitoring, as appears for example from the work by Victor Lesser and colleagues on the Distributed Vehicle Monitoring Testbed. Starting from this pioneering work, a number of techniques for multiagent-based environmental perception have been developed.

In this talk, we will review the state of the art and we will summarize the main techniques used in multiagent systems for environmental perception; finally we will set off some promising future research directions within a coherent and general conceptual framework.