# PEPA: a Persistently Autonomous Embodied Agent with Personalities

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.00117 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.00117/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 16 of its 32 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 21 Feb 2026.

## Builds on (most cited first, 16 of 16)

- [Qwen3 Technical Report](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.09388/) (2025)
- [Qwen2.5 Technical Report](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.15115/) (2024)
- [Overcoming catastrophic forgetting in neural networks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1612.00796/) (2016)
- [Reflexion: Language Agents with Verbal Reinforcement Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.11366/) (2023)
- [A Survey on Large Language Model based Autonomous Agents](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.11432/) (2023)
- [FAST-LIO2: Fast Direct LiDAR-inertial Odometry](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2107.06829/) (2021)
- [Artificial Intelligence for Long-Term Robot Autonomy: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.05196/) (2018)
- [Long-horizon Locomotion and Manipulation on a Quadrupedal Robot with Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.05291/) (2024)
- [Embodied Evolution in Collective Robotics: A Review](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1709.08992/) (2017)
- [Evolving Agents: Interactive Simulation of Dynamic and Diverse Human Personalities](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2404.02718/) (2024)
- [The STRANDS Project: Long-Term Autonomy in Everyday Environments](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1604.04384/) (2016)
- [Formal Definitions of Unbounded Evolution and Innovation Reveal Universal Mechanisms for Open-Ended Evolution in Dynamical Systems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1607.01750/) (2016)
- [Efficient Global Navigational Planning in 3D Structures based on Point Cloud Tomography](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.07631/) (2024)
- [Sophia: A Persistent Agent Framework of Artificial Life](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.18202/) (2025)
- [Evolution of Rewards for Food and Motor Action by Simulating Birth and Death](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.15016/) (2024)
- [Robot Character Generation and Adaptive Human-Robot Interaction with Personality Shaping](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.15518/) (2025)

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [A Taxonomy of Cognitive Capability Gaps in Generative and Agentic AI](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.02553/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Living organisms exhibit persistent autonomy through internally generated goals and self-sustaining behavioral organization, yet current embodied agents remain driven by externally scripted objectives. This dependence on predefined task specifications limits their capacity for long-term deployment in dynamic, unstructured environments where continuous human intervention is impractical. We propose that personality traits provide an intrinsic organizational principle for achieving persistent autonomy. Analogous to genotypic biases shaping biological behavioral tendencies, personalities enable agents to autonomously generate goals and sustain behavioral evolution without external supervision. To realize this, we develop PEPA, a three-layer cognitive architecture that operates through three interacting systems: Sys3 autonomously synthesizes personality-aligned goals and refines them via episodic memory and daily self-reflection; Sys2 performs deliberative reasoning to translate goals into executable action plans; Sys1 grounds the agent in sensorimotor interaction, executing actions and recording experiences. We validate the framework through real-world deployment on a quadruped robot in a multi-floor office building. Operating without reliance on fixed task specifications, the robot autonomously arbitrates between user requests and personality-driven motivations, navigating elevators and exploring environments accordingly. Quantitative analysis across five distinct personality prototypes demonstrates stable, trait-aligned behaviors. The results confirm that personality-driven cognitive architectures enable sustained autonomous operation characteristic of persistent embodied systems. Code and demo videos are available at https://sites.google.com/view/pepa-persistent/.