Fully distributed adaptive tracking control for nonlinear multi-agent systems with nonlinear dynamic inputs based on jointly connected graphs

This work investigates the distributed tracking control framework for specific class of affine nonlinear multi-agent systems with nonlinear disturbance terms under a jointly connected graph topology. First, an innovative nonlinear fully distributed controller is proposed. By introducing adaptive coupling weights that adjust the relative errors among agents in an adaptive manner, the controller enables state trajectory following without relying on global information. Second, by incorporating the jointly connected topology into the nonlinear fully distributed controller, fully distributed adaptive tracking control is guaranteed under the switched connected graphs condition. Using Lyapunov analysis and matrix theory, sufficient conditions for achieving the control objectives of fully distributed nonlinear multi-agent systems under joint connectivity are proposed. Finally, simulation results validate the performance of the designed fully distributed adaptive protocol.