Broadcasting-based Cucker–Smale flocking control for multi-agent systems

This paper investigates the flocking control issue of multi-agent systems, where each agent utilizes the broadcasting communication manner and takes the Cucker–Smale style dynamic model. In the setting of broadcasting scenario, each agent broadcasts the state information only at certain moments determined by its own clock, and recalculates the control input only when its clock ticks or it receives information from the neighbors. In the Cucker–Smale model, a nonlinear weight function about the communication distance is set to portray the mutual influence degree between agents. With the help of the properties of sub-stochastic matrix, a comprehensive analysis of the asymptotic convergence of the model is performed and the algebraic conditions for achieving flocking control are established. In addition, the obtained theoretical results are further extended to the bipartite flocking control issue for multi-agent systems with both cooperative and competitive interactions. At last, numerical simulations are provided to verify the theoretical results.