Decentralization of virtual structures in formation control of multiple vehicle systems via consensus strategies

In this paper, we propose a coordination framework that decentralizes virtual structures in multi-vehicle systems via consensus strategies. We instantiate a local copy of the virtual structure state on each vehicle as well as the same coordination algorithm. Then we develop consensus strategies to guarantee that each instantiation of the virtual structure state comes into consensus when the virtual structure state is driven by a common input or inputs with bounded inconsistency under both fixed and switching interaction topologies. We show conditions under which consensus can be achieved for each instantiation of the virtual structure state and provide boundedness analyses for the inconsistency of different instantiations when inconsistent inputs exist. The decentralized framework is then applied in simulations to a multi-vehicle formation control scenario as a proof of concept.