Distributed Periodic Event-triggered Control of Nonlinear Multi-Agent Systems

TL;DR

This paper introduces a flexible, asynchronous event-triggered control framework for nonlinear multi-agent systems over networks with delays, ensuring stability and Zeno-free operation, demonstrated through consensus applications.

Contribution

It proposes a novel emulation-based, dissipativity-driven approach for distributed control with asynchronous sampling and delay handling in multi-agent systems.

Findings

Ensures Zeno-free event-triggered control in networked multi-agent systems.

Supports asynchronous, non-synchronized sampling platforms.

Demonstrates effectiveness through consensus problem simulations.

Abstract

We present a general emulation-based framework to address the distributed control of multi-agent systems over packet-based networks. We consider the setup where information is only transmitted at (non-uniform) sampling times and where packets are received with unknown delays. We design local dynamic periodic event-triggering mechanisms to generate the transmissions. The triggering mechanisms can run on non-synchronized digital platforms, i.e., we ensure that the conditions must only be verified at asynchronous sampling times, which may differ for each platform. Different stability and performance characteristics can be considered as we follow a general dissipativity-based approach. Moreover, Zeno-free properties are guaranteed by design. The results are illustrated on a consensus problem.