Collisionless and Decentralized Formation Control for Strings

TL;DR

This paper introduces a decentralized control method for multi-agent systems that ensures collision avoidance, flocking behavior, and pattern formation, with rigorous analysis and numerical validation.

Contribution

It presents a novel decentralized feedback controller inspired by vehicle platooning, with theoretical guarantees for collision-free trajectories and pattern convergence.

Findings

Collision-free trajectories are guaranteed under certain conditions.

Flocking behavior towards velocity consensus is achieved.

Agents asymptotically form prescribed distance patterns.

Abstract

A decentralized feedback controller for multi-agent systems, inspired by vehicle platooning, is proposed. The closed loop resulting from the decentralized control action has three distinctive features: the generation of collision-free trajectories, flocking of the system towards a consensus state in velocity, and asymptotic convergence to a prescribed pattern of distances between agents. For each feature, a rigorous dynamical analysis is provided, yielding a characterization of the set of parameters and initial configurations where collision avoidance, flocking, and pattern formation are guaranteed. Numerical tests assess the theoretical results presented.