Second-order consensus tracking of nonlinear multi-agent systems with time delay and intermittent communications

This paper investigates second-order leader-follower consensus tracking problem of multi-agent systems with nonlinear dynamics. Each agent is assumed to share information with its neighbors only in some disconnected and uniformly bounded time intervals. We also assume that there exists bounded time-varying delay in the communication among agents and nonlinear dynamics. First, a novel intermittent consensus tracking protocol is proposed, which guarantees the state of each agent can track that of leader. Then, by using graph theory and Lyapunov approach, the sufficient condition of consistent tracking is presented. Finally, a simulation example is provided to validate the effectiveness of our theoretical result.

1. Introduction

In recent years, distributed cooperative control of multi-agent systems (MAS), which is widely used in all kinds of aspects, has attracted more and more researchers' attention [1]–[4]. Such as, the design of distributed sensor network, the formation control of unmanned aerial vehicle, satellite clusters, and so on [5]–[7]. In many research topics of distributed cooperation, an increasing number of researchers have focused on the problem of consensus, which is an important and fundamental problem in the field of multi-agent cooperative control.