Investigation of Communication Constraints in Distributed Multi-Agent Systems

<p>Based on a simple flocking model with collision avoidance, a set of investigations of multi-agent system communication constraints have been conducted, including distributed estimation of global features, the influence of jamming, and communication performance optimization. In flocking control, it is necessary to achieve a common velocity among agents and maintain a safe distance between neighboring agents. The local information among agents is exchanged in a distributed fashion to help achieve velocity consensus. A distributed estimation algorithm was recently proposed to estimate the group’s global features based on achieving consensus among agents’ local estimations of such global features. To reduce the communication load, the exchange of local estimations among agents occurs at discrete time instants defined by an event-triggering mechanism. To confirm the effectiveness of the new distributed estimation algorithm, we simulated the algorithm while adopting a simple flocking control technique with collision avoidance. In addition, the effect of jamming on flocking control and the distributed algorithm is studied through computer simulations. Finally, to better exploit the communication channel among agents, we study a recently proposed formation control multi-agent algorithm, which optimizes the inter-agent distance in order to achieve optimum inter-agent communication performance. The study is also conducted through computer simulations, which confirms the effectiveness of the algorithm.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science in Electrical & Computer Engineering

Level thesis:degree_level

Thesis - Open Access

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Electrical, Computer, Software, and Systems Engineering

Year

2016

Author dc:creator

• Fu, Zhaoyang

• multi-agent systems
• Electrical and Computer Engineering

Repository record dc:identifier

https://commons.erau.edu/edt/299

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:commons.erau.edu:edt-1298