Output Feedback Based Formation Control of Multi-agent Systems

Time-varying formation control problems for high-order multi-agent systems with directed communication topology are investigated. A general protocol based on output feedback is proposed. By means of variable transformation, the time-varying formation control problems can be transferred into consensus problems and then stabilization problems. Sufficient conditions are obtained based on Lyapunov stability analyses. An algorithm is presented for multi-agent systems with directed topology to achieve time-varying formation. Finally, numerical simulations are provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the theoretical results.