First Order Consensus Control

Nur Shuhaida Bt Musa (B021210059)1, Nursyazwani Bt Awg Marajeh (B021210038)2, Norsyuhada Bt Harun (B021210128)3,
Nurul Atiqah Bt Razlan (B021210249)4, Noreazira Bt Mohd Daud (B021210112)5
Bachelor of Electronic and Computer Engineering

Abstract Consensus problems of first-order multi-agent

are investigated in this paper. A variable transformation
method is used to convert the consensus problem to a
stability problem. Some sufficient consensus conditions are
then derived by using tools from the graph theory and
stability analysis. It is proved that consensus in such a
multi-agent system can be ensured if each agent is
stabilizable and each possible directed topology contains a
directed spanning tree. Finally, a numerical simulation is
given for illustration.

system and verify the theoretical design of the consensus

controller by simulation with Matlab Simulink and Mobile
Sim that +is represented by Amigobot.

II.

METHODOLOGY

Index Terms multi-agent, consensus, first-order.

I. INTRODUCTION
The consensus problem for multi-agent systems has drawn
much attention from researchers in recent years [1, 2], due to
its broad range of application in cooperative control of air
vehicles, formation control of mobile robots and flocking of
multiple agents. In the study of the consensus control, the final
convergence state is an important factor.
One of the main problems in cooperative control of multiagent systems is the consensus problem concerned with the
design of local controllers using relative information to realize
a state agreement in the whole group [3]. Consensus for firstorder multi-agent system with switching directed topologies
has been investigated in [4]. It has been shown that the state of
consensus in such multi-agent systems can be achieved if and
only if the time-varying network topology jointly contains a
directed spanning tree.
The software that have been used throughout this project are
MATLAB, as main tools and Visual Basic to compile all the
program codes. In addition, there are some other software
which have been used to help solving the programming
problem which is are ActivMedia Robotics Interface for
Application (ARIA) +and MobileSim. ARIA is applied
interface for intelligent mobile robots (e.g AmigoBot). Next,
while MobileSim is used to show the simulation test of the
robots formation.
Motivated by the related work, the objective of our project
reported in this paper is to investigate involves (which one?) a
group of multi-agents that utilizes the first order consensus
control algorithm to reach single outcome. Finally, we also
study how to design the consensus control for multi-agent

Figure 1: Flowchart of the system

Initially, a research related with the project was done before
the project can be started. Based on flowchart in Figure 1
shows the methodology of the project for the first order
consensus control. Each of the processes needs to be
implemented in order to complete in this project.

At the beginning, the project will start with modelling

(modeling) the system by understanding the graph theory. A
graph theory is a nonempty finite set of vertices V along with
a set E of 2-element subsets of V. The elements of V are called
vertices, and the elements of E are called edges. Let G = {V,
E, A} be a weighted diagraph consisting of a set of vertices V
= {v1,v2,vn}, a set of edges E V x V and a weighted
adjacency matrix A = {aij} Rnx n. The node indexes belong to
a finite index set N = {1, 2, , n}. After that, Laplacian
matrix of the diagraph is defined as,

. For an

undirected graph, L is symmetric. For a directed graph, L is

not necessarily matrix. Laplacian matrix is importance
(important) in the study of dynamical multi-agent systems on
group. The row sums of the Laplacian are all 0.
The basic idea of a consensus algorithm is to impose
similar dynamics on the information states of each agent. If
the communication network among agent allows continuous
communication or if the communication bandwidth is
sufficiently large, then the information state update of each
agent is model (is modeled) using a differential equation. This
section is overviews (is overviewed) consensus algorithms in
which a scalar information state is updated by each agent
using a first-order differential equation.
After completing the equation, the system was (is)
simulated in MATLAB Simulink software. In MATLAB
Simulink, the system will have subsystems that represented
the agent. After the program successfully designed, the system
was (is) developed by compiling the program codes in Visual
Basic and run in Mobile Sim software. If the programming
code has an error during simulation, the corrections need to be
done.
If the system is working properly, the system will be tested
and troubleshoot to make sure that the system is functioning as
desired. Finally, the project will be end up with gathering and
analyze the output data from the result.

Figure 2: Flowchart of the formation control.

Flowchart in Figure 2 explains the flow process of
Amigobots starting from the initializing the robots to
determine which one is the leader and follower. Next, set the
input in coordinates to locate the robots from the starting
point. At this stage, the looping has been started and get (gets)
the current position before computing the control logic for
each of the robot. Lastly, set the velocity and the steering
velocity of robots to navigate the latest position of the robots.
Block diagram that is shown in Figure 3 explains the flow
of the system that have (has) been used in this project.
Feedback control is good at ensuring stability and
compensating for interference. In most of situation,
particularly the real-world application, the disturbance is
exists, so feedback control is more preferable than the openloop control.

Figure 3: General structure of feedback system

 1
0

0
D
0
0

Figure 4: The control strategy of leader-follower method.

III.

RESULT

In this section, some basic concepts and results about

algebraic graph theory and model formulation are introduced.
In this paper, we (have chosen) choose 6 multi-agents
consensus control.

1
0
0
0
0

0
1
0
0
0

0
0
1
0
0

0
0
0
1
0

1
1

1
D
0
0

0
0

0
0

0
1

0
0

1
1
1
0
0

0
1
0
1
0

0
0
1
0
1

0
0
0
1
1

0
1
1
0
0

0
0
0
1
0

0
0
0
0
1

0
0
0
0
1

1
0

0
0

0
1
0

0
0

So, the Laplacian matrix is

1
1

1
L=
0
0

2
1
1
0
0

0
2
0
1
0

0
0
1
0
1

0
0
0
1
1

0
1
0

0
0

In both the undirected and directed cases, L has a zero row

sums, 0 is an eigen value of L with the associated eigen vector
1 [1, , 1]T, the next nx1 column vector of ones.
Let the differential equation satisfies the consensus algorithm
Figure 5: 6 multi-agent consensus controls
G = {V, E, A}
V = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6}
E = {{1, 2}, {1, 3}, {1, 5}, {1, 6}, {2, 3}, {3, 4}, {4, 1},
{4, 3}, {4, 5}, {5, 6}, {6, 1}}
For adjacency matrix,

Let D be the degree matrix of G, which is defined as a

diagonal matrix with the out-degree of each node along its
diagonal. Let D is defined as

Since the 6 agents are used, then it will have 6 equations.

Figure 6: Output error from Microsoft Visual Basic.

Throughout the research, the program codes are found and

run (processed) using Microsoft Visual Basic software. ARIA
is installed and the files. (?) . There are some error occurs
regarding the .obj file. The .obj file that contain objectoriented that some of the files are undefined. (?)

Figure 7: Snapshots from the triagular formation.[6]

The preliminary result as supposedly achieve in this project
is shown in Figure 7. The simulation and implementation
results prove the effectiveness of the design and give support
to the AmigoBots platform [6]. Due to the cost restraints, this
project proceed up until demo in the simulation only.
The first two picture (pictures) in Figure 7 shows (show) the
initial position of AmigoBot that is (are) placed randomly
before the formation +is applied and followed by the detection
between leader and followers. When the leader has detected by
followers, the followers will go to the actual position which is

shown in following picture. Next, they are moving in pace in

form of formation control.
IV.

SIMULATION

The system was designed with more than 2 multi agents. A

directed graph was shown in Figure 3.
The directed graph is strongly connected between the
agents. The figure below shows the result from MATLAB
Simulink software. In the system have a subsystem for each
agents. Each block was build based on equation,

In MATLAB Simulink, the blocks used to build the system

are subsystem, additional block, product block. The
combinations of the blocks are to drive the output.

Figure 9: Block of each subsystem

The Figure 4 below shows the result obtained from the
simulation. The result shows the communication between
multi agents is connected to each other. From the derivation of
the theorem, the strong connectivity of graph is shown below.
7
x 0(1)

Information states

6.5

x 1(1)

x 2(1)

5.5

x 3(1)
x 4(1)

x 5(1)

4.5
4
3.5
3
2.5

Figure 8: A system with 6 multi agent

10

15

20
t(sec)

25

30

35

40

Figure 10: Information state of 6 agents network

V.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, the system works as desired. The

objectives of the project to investigate a group of multi-agent
that utilize the first order consensus control algorithm and
reach single outcome is (are) achieved. This project trained us
to work effectively in a group without knowing each other at
first.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
First of all, we would like to thanks to our supervisor, Mr.
Ahmad Sadhiqin Bin Mohd Isira, for his helpful and offered
invaluable assistance, support and guidance from start to final
stage in order to fully complete this Integrated Design Project.
Last but not least, we would like to thanks to all of our
group members, for being cooperative and hardworking
during the completion of this project from the start to the end
until we can finish this project successfully and can full
fill(fulfill) the requirement task given for this subject.
REFERENCES
[1]

[2]
[3]

[4]
[5]

Z. Li, Z. Duan, G. Chen, and L. Huang, Consensus of

Multiagent Systems and Synchronization of Complex
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224, 2010.
W. Ren, Multi-vehicle consensus with a time-varying
reference state , vol. 56, pp. 474483, 2007.
C. G. Behavior and T. L. Interaction, in Multivehicle
Cooperative Control COLLECTIVE GROUP BEHAVIOR
THROUGH LOCAL INTERACTION, no. April, pp. 71
82, 2007.
J. A. Fax and R. M. Murray, Information Flow and
Cooperative Control of Vehicle Formations, vol. 49, no. 9,
pp. 14651476, 2004.
W. Wang, Adaptive Consensus Tracking Control of
Uncertain Nonlinear Systems: A First-Order Example, vol.
2012, no. December, pp. 57, 2012.