A framework for distributed control via dynamic periodic event-triggering mechanisms

Dynamic event-triggered mechanisms (ETMs) have shown potential in further reducing the number of events in comparison to their static counterparts while delivering similar system performance. In this paper, we provide a framework to design dynamic periodic event-triggered controllers for multi-agent systems (MASs) with nonlinear dynamics. A preliminary version of this work on single-agent systems was studied in Dhullipalla et al. (2020). The design methodology adopts an emulation-based technique that assumes the existence of a continuous-time state feedback controller that stabilizes the MAS. The dynamic ETMs are constructed based on an agent's ability or inability to sense states (or relative states) of fellow agents in the network. To illustrate the design methodologies, two case studies on nonlinear MASs (with Lipschitz and one-sided Lipschitz dynamics), interacting over undirected and directed communication networks, are presented. Finally, the results of the case studies are demonstrated via numerical examples.