Time-Varying Formation Tracking Control of Multi-Leader Multiagent Systems With Sampled-Data

In this paper, the time-varying formation tracking (TVFT) problem of multi-leader multi-agent systems (MASs) under sampled-data control is studied. First, an improved TVFT criterion is derived by employing a general looped-functional and a zero integral functional. Then a new TVFT controller is designed based on our proposed method. Unlike the existing works, the TVFT controller can allow for bigger sampling intervals of multi-leader MASs. The results demonstrate that the states of the followers can form the designated formation and rotate around the convex combination formed by the multiple leaders. In addition, we generalize the results of TVFT to the sampled-data consensus for MASs, a sampled-data consensus controller which can reduce communication consumption is designed. Meanwhile, the values of the allowable maximum sampling intervals (AMSIs) are calculated. Finally, the superiority and availability of the theoretical results are verified by two simulation experiments. Note to Practitioners— The motivation of this paper is to address the problem of TVFT for MAS with multiple leaders. It has been applied to several practical engineering systems, e.g., satellite formation control and unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) formation control. Note that information exchange is a prerequisite to ensure safe and stable control of multi-UAV formation. However, continuous-time communication is difficult to be realized in the actual environment, and it will inevitably consume a lot of energy. In addition, sampled-data controller for MAS with a small sampling interval may cause network congestion. Therefore, a sampled-data controller which allows for a bigger sampling interval for MAS is designed to save network resources in this paper. Through simulation experiments, it can be proved that the followers not only track the leaders, but also form the designated formation.