Leader-following Consensus and Trajectory Tracking for Nonholonomic Mobile Robots

Abstract

In this paper, a trajectory tracking algorithm for leader and a leader-following consensus control law for followers are investigated for nonholonomic mobile robots. First, by using the trajectory tracking algorithm, the leader can be guaranteed on the desired position, attitude, velocity and angular velocity. Second, based on the traditional consensus problem of multiagent systems, we propose an improved consensus algorithm to account for input saturations and remove the requirement of velocity measurements. Finally, a convoy formation is achieved. In the formation, the leader moves in the trajectory expected in the mission, while the followers convoy the leaderwith a certain formation, which can be time-varying or time-invariant. The performance of the algorithm is demonstrated by simulation.