Consensus-Based Formation Control with Time Synchronization for a Decentralized Group of Mobile Robots

The development and study of an optimal control method for the problem of controlling the formation of a group of mobile robots is still a current and popular theme of work. However, there are few works that take into account the issues of time synchronization of units in a decentralized group. The motivation for taking up this topic was the possibility of improving the accuracy of the movement of a group of robots by including dynamic time synchronization in the control algorithm. The aim of this work was to develop a two-layer synchronous motion control system for a decentralized group of mobile robots. The system consists of a master layer and a sublayer. The sublayer of the control system performs the task of tracking the reference trajectory using a single robot with a kinematic and dynamic controller. In this layer, the input and output signals are linear and angular velocity. The master layer realizes the maintenance of the desired group formation and synchronization of robots during movement. Consensus tracking and virtual structure algorithms were used to implement this level of control. To verify the correctness of operation and evaluate the quality of control for the proposed proprietary approach, simulation studies were conducted in the MATLAB/Simulink environment, followed by laboratory tests using real robots under ROS. The developed system can successfully find application in transportation and logistics tasks in both civilian and military areas.