Cooperative Adaptive Cruise Control of Vehicles Using a Resource-Efficient Communication Mechanism

In this study, a resource-efficient communication mechanism is investigated for the cooperative adaptive cruise control (CACC) of vehicles subject to actuator delay and disturbances. Specifically, a dynamic event-triggered communication mechanism (DECM) is designed for a tracking error (spacing error, velocity error, and acceleration error) based sampled-data feedback controller. Under the DECM, the transmissions of sampled velocity and acceleration from a preceding vehicle to the controller can be significantly reduced. Sufficient conditions for the stability of the CACC system are obtained for the DECM-based sampled-data feedback controller. According to the obtained conditions, parameter design criteria are established for the DECM to guarantee the stable performance of CACC systems. Simulation studies illustrate that the proposed DECM-based CACC system can not only save inter-vehicle communication resources, but also guarantee stable performance.