There have been papers published about making robots and autopilot-like systems robust to all sorts of "system degradation" such as obstructed optics, missing s

There have been papers published about making robots and autopilot-like systems robust to all sorts of "system degradation" such as obstructed optics, missing signals, noisy signals, etc... I can't find the reference any more, but one particularly impressive result was a four-wheeled robot that could tolerate the loss of a wheel, distortions of the entire chassis, and multiple faulty sensors all at the same time!