Distributed Fault-Tolerant Consensus Tracking Control of Multi-Agent Systems under Fixed and Switching Topologies

This paper proposes a novel distributed fault-tolerant consensus tracking control design for multi-agent systems with abrupt and incipient actuator faults under fixed and switching topologies. The fault and state information of each individual agent is estimated by merging unknown input observer in the decentralized fault estimation hierarchy. Then, two kinds of distributed fault-tolerant consensus tracking control schemes with average dwelling time technique are developed to guarantee the mean-square exponential consensus convergence of multi-agent systems, respectively, on the basis of the relative neighboring output information as well as the estimated information in fault estimation. Simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed fault-tolerant consensus tracking control algorithm

Performance analysis with network-enhanced complexities: On fading measurements, event-triggered mechanisms, and cyber attacks

Copyright © 2014 Derui Ding et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Nowadays, the real-world systems are usually subject to various complexities such as parameter uncertainties, time-delays, and nonlinear disturbances. For networked systems, especially large-scale systems such as multiagent systems and systems over sensor networks, the complexities are inevitably enhanced in terms of their degrees or intensities because of the usage of the communication networks. Therefore, it would be interesting to (1) examine how this kind of network-enhanced complexities affects the control or filtering performance; and (2) develop some suitable approaches for controller/filter design problems. In this paper, we aim to survey some recent advances on the performance analysis and synthesis with three sorts of fashionable network-enhanced complexities, namely, fading measurements, event-triggered mechanisms, and attack behaviors of adversaries. First, these three kinds of complexities are introduced in detail according to their engineering backgrounds, dynamical characteristic, and modelling techniques. Then, the developments of the performance analysis and synthesis issues for various networked systems are systematically reviewed. Furthermore, some challenges are illustrated by using a thorough literature review and some possible future research directions are highlighted.This work was supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grants 61134009, 61329301, 61203139, 61374127, and 61374010, the Royal Society of the UK, and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany

Defense and Tolerance Technique Against Attacks and Faults on Leader-Following Multi-USVs

This study explores the leader-following consensus tracking control issue of multiple unmanned surface vehicles (multi-USVs) in the presence of malicious connectivity-mixed attacks in the cyber layer, and concurrent output channel noises, sensor/actuator faults, and wave-induced disturbances in the physical layer. Sensor/actuator faults are initially modeled with unified incipient and abrupt features. Additionally, connectivity-mixed attacks are depicted using connectivity-paralyzed and connectivity-maintained topologies through nonoverlapping and switching iterations. The standardization and observer design in multi-USVs are incorporated to decouple the augmented dynamics and estimate unknown state, fault, and noise observations, and then a defense and fault-tolerant consensus tracking control approach is designed to accomplish the robustness to disturbances/noises, resilience to attacks, and tolerance to faults, simultaneously. The criteria for achieving leader-following exponential consensus tracking of multi-USVs with cyber-physical threats can be determined based on activation rate and attack frequency indicators. Comparative simulations outline the effectiveness and economy of the proposed defense and tolerance technique against sensor/actuator faults and cyber-attacks on multi-USVs

Consensus tracking of nonlinear agents using distributed nonlinear dynamic inversion with switching leader-follower connection

In this paper, a consensus tracking protocol for nonlinear agents is presented, which is based on the Nonlinear Dynamic Inversion (NDI) technique. Implementation of such a technique is new in the context of the consensus tracking problem. The tracking capability of nonlinear dynamic inversion (NDI) is exploited for a leader-follower multi-agent scenario. We have provided all the mathematical details to establish its theoretical foundation. Additionally, a convergence study is provided to show the efficiency of the proposed controller. The performance of the proposed controller is evaluated in the presence of both (a) random switching topology among the agents and (b) random switching of leader–follower connections, which is realistic and not reported in the literature. The follower agents track various trajectories generated by a dynamic leader, which describes the tracking capability of the proposed controller. The results obtained from the simulation study show how efficiently this controller can handle the switching topology and switching leader-follower connections.Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC): EP/R009953/