Consensus Tracking of Switched Heterogeneous Nonlinear Systems With Uncertain Target

This paper proposes a new dual-design framework to investigate the consensus tracking problem of general switched heterogeneous nonlinear multi-agent systems (MASs) with an uncertain target. A distributed observer that only uses the neighbors’ information is constructed to estimate the target signal by designing a time-varying positive-define matrix function and mode-dependent observer gain matrices. After that, a distributed tracking algorithm is developed to solve the three consensus issues among the observer states, tracker states, and target states at the same time by utilizing the neighbors’ observer states and designing additional mode-dependent feedback gain matrices. The distinct merit of the research is that the designed Lyapunov function is strict monotone decreasing at switching instants, discovering the positive effect of the switching on the consensus. As an application, heterogeneous switched Chua’s circuits are provided to demonstrate the distributed observers and tracking algorithms.