Synchronization of autonomous agents by an optimal networked controller
Andrej Mosebach, Jan Lunze · 2014
This paper investigates the synchronization of identical linear agents based on optimal control methods. Besides asymptotic synchronization the transient behavior of the networked multi-agent system is required to minimize an LQ-like performance index which is chosen so as to reflect the motion of the synchronization errors. The resulting optimization problem is non-convex because the networked controller has to satisfy structural constraints. However, a necessary condition for optimality is derived and it is shown that determining the optimal networked controller is computationally expensive. Therefore, an algorithm is proposed that uses a gradient method to solve the optimization problem for a given initial networked controller.