Superhuman Safe and Agile Racing through Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning

Fuente: arXiv
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Autores principales: Geles, Ismail, Bauersfeld, Leonard, Wulfmeier, Markus, Scaramuzza, Davide
Formato: Preprint
Publicado: 2026
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author Geles, Ismail
Bauersfeld, Leonard
Wulfmeier, Markus
Scaramuzza, Davide
author_facet Geles, Ismail
Bauersfeld, Leonard
Wulfmeier, Markus
Scaramuzza, Davide
contents Autonomous systems have achieved superhuman performance in isolation or simulation, yet they remain brittle in shared, dynamic real-world spaces. This failure stems from the dominant single-agent paradigm for physical applications, where other actors are ignored or treated as environmental noise, preventing effective coordination. Here we show that multi-agent reinforcement learning provides the essential safety scaffolding required for real-world interaction. Using high-speed quadrotor racing as a high-stakes testbed, we train agents to navigate complex aerodynamic interactions and strategic maneuvering with a variable number of racers. Through league-based self-play, agents evolve sophisticated anticipatory behaviors, including proactive collision avoidance, overtaking, and handling multi-agent physical interactions, including aerodynamic downwash. Our agents outperform a champion-level human pilot in multi-player races at speeds exceeding 22 m/s, while simultaneously reducing collision rates by 50 % compared to state-of-the-art single-agent baselines. Crucially, training with diverse artificial agents enables zero-shot generalization to safer human interaction. These results suggest that the path to robust robotic co-existence lies not in isolated safety constraints, but in the rigorous demands of multi-agent interaction. Multimedia materials are available at: https://rpg.ifi.uzh.ch/marl
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2605_22748
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Superhuman Safe and Agile Racing through Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning
Geles, Ismail
Bauersfeld, Leonard
Wulfmeier, Markus
Scaramuzza, Davide
Robotics
Artificial Intelligence
Machine Learning
Multiagent Systems
Autonomous systems have achieved superhuman performance in isolation or simulation, yet they remain brittle in shared, dynamic real-world spaces. This failure stems from the dominant single-agent paradigm for physical applications, where other actors are ignored or treated as environmental noise, preventing effective coordination. Here we show that multi-agent reinforcement learning provides the essential safety scaffolding required for real-world interaction. Using high-speed quadrotor racing as a high-stakes testbed, we train agents to navigate complex aerodynamic interactions and strategic maneuvering with a variable number of racers. Through league-based self-play, agents evolve sophisticated anticipatory behaviors, including proactive collision avoidance, overtaking, and handling multi-agent physical interactions, including aerodynamic downwash. Our agents outperform a champion-level human pilot in multi-player races at speeds exceeding 22 m/s, while simultaneously reducing collision rates by 50 % compared to state-of-the-art single-agent baselines. Crucially, training with diverse artificial agents enables zero-shot generalization to safer human interaction. These results suggest that the path to robust robotic co-existence lies not in isolated safety constraints, but in the rigorous demands of multi-agent interaction. Multimedia materials are available at: https://rpg.ifi.uzh.ch/marl
title Superhuman Safe and Agile Racing through Multi-Agent Reinforcement Learning
topic Robotics
Artificial Intelligence
Machine Learning
Multiagent Systems
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.22748