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A unified approach to output synchronization of heterogeneous multi-agent systems via L2-gain design

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Abstract

In this paper, a unified design procedure is given for output synchronization of heterogeneous multi-agent systems (MAS) on communication graph topologies, using relative output measurements from neighbors. Three different control protocols, namely, full-state feedback, static output-feedback, and dynamic output-feedback, are designed for output synchronization. It is seen that a unified design procedure for heterogeneous MAS can be given by formulation and solution of a suitable local L2-gain design problem. Sufficient conditions are developed in terms of stabilizing the local agents’ dynamics, satisfying a certain small-gain criterion, and solving the output regulator equations. Local design procedures are presented for each agent to guarantee that these sufficient conditions are satisfied. The proposed control protocols require only one copy of the leader’s dynamics in the compensator, regardless of the dimensions of the outputs. This results in lower-dimensional compensators for systems with high-order outputs, compared to the p-copy internal model approach. All three proposed control protocols are verified using numerical simulations.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Automation Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu Sichuan, 611731, China

    Shan Zuo & Yongduan Song

  2. The University of Texas at Arlington Research Institute, Fort Worth, TX, 76118, U.S.A.

    Shan Zuo, Hamidreza Modares, Frank L. Lewis & Ali Davoudi

Authors
  1. Shan Zuo
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  2. Yongduan Song
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  3. Hamidreza Modares
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  4. Frank L. Lewis
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  5. Ali Davoudi
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shan Zuo.

Additional information

This paper is dedicated to Professor T. J. Tarn on the occasion of his 80th birthday.

This work was supported in part by the State Key Development Program for Basic Research of China (No. 2012CB215202), in part by the National Science Foundation (No. ECCS-1405173), in part by the Office of Naval Research (No. N00014-17-1-2239).

Shan ZUO received the B.Sc. degree in Physical Electronics from University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China, in 2012. She is working toward the Ph.D. degree in the School of Automation Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China since 2012. She is currently working toward the Joint Ph.D. degree in the University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX, U.S.A. since 2014, supported by the China Scholarship Council. Her research interests include distributed synchronization control, distributed containment control, microgrid systems, and smart grid.

Yongduan SONG (M’92-SM’10) received the Ph.D. degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Tennessee Technological University, Cookeville, TN, U.S.A., in 1992. He held a tenured Full Professor position with North Carolina A&T State University, Greensboro, from 1993 to 2008 and a Langley Distinguished Professor position with the National Institute of Aerospace, Hampton, VA, from 2005 to 2008. He is now the Dean of School of Automation, Chongqing University, and the Founding Director of the Institute of Smart Systems and Renewable Energy, Chongqing University. He was one of the six Langley Distinguished Professors with the National Institute of Aerospace (NIA), Founding Director of Cooperative Systems at NIA. He has served as an Associate Editor/Guest Editor for several prestigious scientific journals. Prof. Song has received several competitive research awards from the National Science Foundation, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the U.S. Air Force Office, the U.S. Army Research Office, and the U.S. Naval Research Office. His research interests include intelligent systems, guidance navigation and control, bio-inspired adaptive and cooperative systems, rail traffic control and safety, and smart grid.

Hamidreza MODARES received the B.Sc. degree from the University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran, in 2004, the M.Sc. degree from the Shahrood University of Technology, Shahrood, Iran, in 2006, and the Ph.D. degree from The University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, TX, U.S.A., in 2015. He was a Senior Lecturer with the Shahrood University of Technology, from 2006 to 2009 and a Faculty Research Associate with the University of Texas at Arlington, from 2015 to 2016. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department, Missouri University of Science and Technology, Rolla, MO, U.S.A. His current research interests include cyber-physical systems, reinforcement learning, distributed control, robotics, and machine learning. He is an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems. He has received Best Paper Award from 2015 IEEE International Symposium on Resilient Control Systems.

Frank L. LEWIS Member, National Academy of Inventors. Fellow IEEE, Fellow IFAC, Fellow AAAS, Fellow U.K. Institute of Measurement & Control, PE Texas, U.K. Chartered Engineer. UTA Distinguished Scholar Professor, UTA Distinguished Teaching Professor, and Moncrief-O-Donnell Chair at the University of Texas at Arlington Research Institute. Qian Ren Thousand Talents Consulting Professor, Northeastern University, Shenyang, China. He obtained the Bachelor’s degree in Physics/EE and the MSEE at Rice University, the MS in Aeronautical Engineering from Univ. W. Florida, and the Ph.D. at Ga. Tech. He works in feedback control, intelligent systems, cooperative control systems, and nonlinear systems. He is author of 7 U.S. patents, numerous journal special issues, journal papers, and 20 books, including Optimal Control, Aircraft Control, Optimal Estimation, and Robot Manipulator Control which are used as university textbooks worldwide. He received the Fulbright Research Award, NSF Research Initiation Grant, ASEE Terman Award, Int. Neural Network Soc. Gabor Award, U.K. Inst Measurement & Control Honeywell Field Engineering Medal, IEEE Computational Intelligence Society Neural Networks Pioneer Award, AIAA Intelligent Systems Award. Received Outstanding Service Award from Dallas IEEE Section, selected as Engineer of the year by Ft. Worth IEEE Section. Was listed in Ft. Worth Business Press Top 200 Leaders in Manufacturing. Texas Regents Outstanding Teaching Award 2013. He is Distinguished Visiting Professor at Nanjing University of Science & Technology and Project 111 Professor at Northeastern University in Shenyang, China. Founding Member of the Board of Governors of the Mediterranean Control Association.

Ali DAVOUDI (S-04-M-11-SM-15) received his Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL, U.S.A., in 2010. He is currently an Associate Professor in the Electrical Engineering Department, University of Texas, Arlington, TX, U.S.A. He is an Associate Editor for the IEEE Transactions on Transportation Electrification, the IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion, and the IEEE Power Letters. He has received 2014 Ralph H. Lee Prize Paper Award from IEEE Transactions on Industry Applications, Best Paper Award from 2015 IEEE International Symposium on Resilient Control Systems, 2014-2015 Best Paper Award from IEEE Transactions on Energy Conversion, 2016 Prize Paper Award from the IEEE Power and Energy Society, and 2017 IEEE Richard M. Bass Outstanding Young Power Electronics Engineer Award.

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Zuo, S., Song, Y., Modares, H. et al. A unified approach to output synchronization of heterogeneous multi-agent systems via L2-gain design. Control Theory Technol. 15, 340–353 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11768-017-7067-0

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