Constrained Interaction and Coordination in Proximity-Limited Multiagent Systems

In this paper, we consider the problem of controlling the interactions of a group of mobile agents, subject to a set of topological constraints. Assuming proximity-limited interagent communication, we leverage mobility, unlike prior work, to enable adjacent agents to interact discriminatively, i.e., to actively retain or reject communication links on the basis of constraint satisfaction. Specifically, we propose a distributed scheme that consists of hybrid controllers with discrete switching for link discrimination, coupled with attractive and repulsive potentials fields for mobility control, where constraint violation predicates form the basis for discernment. We analyze the application of constrained interaction to two canonical coordination objectives, i.e., aggregation and dispersion, with maximum and minimum node degree constraints, respectively. For each task, we propose predicates and control potentials, and examine the dynamical properties of the resulting hybrid systems. Simulation results demonstrate the correctness of our proposed methods and the ability of our framework to generate topology-aware coordinated behavior.