Time-varying formation control for swarm systems with communication constraints

Time-varying formation analysis and design problems for high-order swarm systems with communication constraints are investigated. Firstly, a time-varying formation control protocol is proposed only using intermittent relative local information. Then, sufficient conditions for time-varying formation analysis and design are given by linear matrix inequality techniques. Moreover, an explicit expression of the formation center function is presented to describe the movement trajectory of the whole formation. When the desired time-varying formation satisfies the formation feasibility condition, swarm systems with communication constraints can achieve time-varying formation by designing the formation control protocol if the nominal coverage rate is larger than a positive threshold. Finally, a numerical simulation is provided to demonstrate theoretical results.