Event-triggered finite-time formation tracking of multi-agent systems with mismatched disturbances under switching topologies

The formation tracking of the leader–follower multi-agent systems (MASs) under switching topologies is investigated. The considered system is exposed to both the mismatched and matched disturbances in the dynamics of the leader and followers, which places higher requirements for the robustness of the control protocol. In the presence of disturbances and leader’s unknown control input, an innovative distributed observer embedded with robust terms is designed firstly to estimate leader’s states in finite time. Taking account of the switching topologies, a novel analysis scheme that divides the convergence process into two stages is proposed to establish the finite-time (FT) convergence of estimation errors. Then, by virtue of a constructed auxiliary variable, a FT controller with an event-triggered mechanism is put forward, in which multiple robust feedback terms are designed wisely to suppress the mismatched and matched disturbances effectively. As a result, the FT formation tracking can be achieved with saved resources, despite perturbed environments and switching topologies. Simulation examples are presented to confirm the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.