Predictive control for trajectory tracking and decentralized navigation of multi-agent formations

This paper addresses a predictive control strategy for a particular class of multi-agent formations with a time-varying topology. The goal is to guarantee tracking capabilities with respect to a reference trajectory which is pre-specified for an agent designed as the leader. Then, the remaining agents, designed as followers, track the position and orientation of the leader. In real-time, a predictive control strategy enhanced with the potential field methodology is used in order to derive a feedback control action based only on local information within the group of agents. The main concern is that the interconnections between the agents are time-varying, affecting the neighborhood around each agent. The proposed method exhibits effective performance validated through some illustrative examples.