Cooperative output feedback consensus control of second-order nonlinear multi-agent systems under Markovian switching topologies

Abstract

This paper deals with the leader-following consensus problem for a class of second-order nonlinear multi-agent systems by output feedback. The communication topology is characterized by a Markovian switching graph. Firstly, an input-driven observer is introduced to estimate the consensus error of each follower agent. Then, a cooperative nonlinear control law is constructed using the relative output information between neighboring agents by employing the backstepping methodology, which achieves leader-following consensus in mean square sense. Compared with the existing results, the nonlinear functions are required to satisfy polynomial growth condition rather than globally Lipschitz growth or Lipschitz-like growth condition. A numerical example is given to illustrate the theoretical results.

Keywords:

• Multi-agent systems
• nonlinear systems
• Markovian switching topology
• output feedback

Acknowledgements

The authors are grateful to the editor, the associate editor and the anonymous referees for very helpful suggestions and comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (No. 20dz1207000).

Notes on contributors

Chuanrui Wang

Chuanrui Wang received his Ph.D. degree in Control Theory and Engineering from University of Science and Technology of China in 2014. He is currently an engineer in Shanghai Zhongchuan SDT-NERC Co., Ltd. His research interests include nonlinear control.

Hua Zhang

Hua Zhang received the B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering from Naval University of Engineering in 2009. He is currently an engineer in Shanghai Zhongchuan SDT-NERC Co., Ltd. and Marine Design and Research Institute of China. His research interests include ship information system integration.

Shuai Zhang

Shuai Zhang received his M.S. degree from Shanghai Maritime University in 2015. He is currently an engineer in Shanghai Zhongchuan SDT-NERC Co., Ltd. His research interests include ship intelligent control system.