Distributed Control Algorithm for Workload Partition of Multi-agent Systems with Time Delay

In the problem of multi-agent coverage, a group of agents are required to cover a given region or clean the workload as soon as possible. The workload partition can improve the work efficiency of multi-agent systems. In addition, the communication delays play a key role in the stability of multi-agent systems. Thus, a distributed control algorithm of workload partition with time delay is proposed in this work. Meanwhile, an approach based on nonlinear matrix inequality is presented to find the maximum delay of multi-agent systems. Finally, experiments are carried out to investigate the effect of delay on system stability on the ZigBee platform.