Cooperative target-capturing with inaccurate target information

This paper presents distributed formation control of a multi-agent system to encircle a maneuvering target using Lyapunov and graph theories with emphasis on consensus and cooperation. The proposed approach embeds a consensus algorithm into a robust controller to capture a target whose information is partially known. To address this issue, a cooperative strategy in conjunction with a controller is proposed to enable a fleet of UAVs either to escort a target to a desired destination or to keep the target movement restricted in a certain set in order to gain superiority. We have employed a sliding mode controller to achieve a target centered formation whose information is partially available to the capturing vehicles. Simulation results are presented to validate the proposed approach.