Distributed Averaging and Balancing in Network Systems

The emergence of complex systems that are controlled over wireless and wired broadband networks, ranging from smart grids and traffic networks to embedded electronic devices and robotic networks, has sparked huge interest in distributed control problems. This is due to the need to properly coordinate the information exchange between sensors, actuators, and controllers in order to enforce a desirable behavior, without relying on a centralized decision maker. This monograph focuses on the key operations of distributed average consensus and weight/flow balancing under a variety of communication topologies and adversarial network conditions such as delays and packet drops. Divided into two parts, Theory and Applications, it first provides the reader with thorough grounding into the theory underpinning the research before discussing two applications in detail. Namely, the coordination of distributed energy resources and the computation of PageRank values. The monograph will be of interest to all researchers, students and practitioners working control, coordination, and optimization tasks in many emerging networked applications.