Bounded Observer-Based Consensus Algorithm for Robust Finite-Time Tracking Control of Multiple Nonholonomic Chained-Form Systems

• Published in: IEEE transactions on automatic control Vol. 66; no. 10; pp. 4933 - 4938
• Main Authors: Sarrafan, Neda, Zarei, Jafar
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York IEEE 01.10.2021; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Actuators; Algorithms; Bounded fast terminal sliding-mode control (TSMC); consensus tracking; Control algorithms; Control theory; Convergence; finite-time distributed observer; Hyperbolic functions; Mobile robots; Multi-agent systems; multiagent nonholonomic chained-form systems; Multiagent systems; Observers; Protocols; Robust control; Saturation; Sliding mode control; Tracking control; Tracking loops; Tracking problem; Upper bound; Upper bounds
• ISSN: 0018-9286; 1558-2523
• DOI: 10.1109/TAC.2020.3048931

This article is concerned with the leader-follower consensus tracking problem for multiagent systems with nonholonomic high-order chained-form dynamics subject to external disturbances. A novel distributed and bounded observer is first developed for each follower to estimate the leader information in a finite time. Then, a bounded fast terminal sliding-mode control protocol is constructed for each follower to track the estimated leader's states leading to the fast convergence performance as well as strong robustness. Contrary to some existing finite-time consensus tracking schemes, the control input constraint is taken into account by utilizing hyperbolic tangent saturation function to reduce the risk of the actuator saturation. Moreover, an approximation-based technique is introduced to reduce the conservatism of the upper bound of convergence time. Finally, some simulations for a set of wheeled mobile robots are carried out to demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed control algorithm.