Robust consensus tracking of one‐sided Lipschitz nonlinear multi‐agent systems under structured uncertainty and time‐varying delay

Abstract This article delves into the intricate matter of achieving robust consensus tracking of multi‐agent systems with structured uncertainty, one‐sided Lipschitz nonlinearity and time‐varying delay. It is important to note that the time delay is both time‐varying and bounded. To solve the consensus tracking problem of multi‐agent systems, we transform it into the stability problem of an error system. Then, a Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional, incorporating the free‐weighting matrix technique and integral inequality approach, is designed to investigate the stability of the obtained error system. The Leibnitz–Newton formula and its associated relationships among terms are also taken into account. Then, two distributed control strategyies that respectively utilizes relative state and output information of neighboring agents are designed. This approach enables us to find a feasible solution to the consensus tracking problem. Finally, several numerical examples are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed theoretical results.