Fixed-Time Formation Tracking Control of Nonlinear Multi-Agent Systems with Directed Topology and Disturbance

In this paper, we study the fixed-time formation (FixF) control problem for the nonlinear second-order multi-agent systems (MASs) with directed graph, where all agents are subject to communication disturbances. To overcome the bounded disturbance of communication and to guarantee the realization of predesignated formation within a fixed-time, a suitable FixF control protocol based on the backstepping method is proposed. Furthermore, to eliminate the dependence of the control parameters on global information, a new adaptive FixF control protocol is provided to combine with some mild conditions of control gain such that the formation with acceptable bounded error of MASs can be achieved within a fixed-time. Finally, the theoretical results are verified by two simulation examples, one of the simulation examples is that we set the desired formation as a regular octagon and the desired formation motion trajectory as a circle, the results show that all agents can form formation motion within a fixed-time.