Adaptive containment control of nonlinear multi-agent systems with state constraints

This paper investigates the finite-time adaptive containment control problem for a class of nonlinear multiagent systems subject to full state constraints. Unlike existing literature that predominantly focused on multi-agent systems with integrator-type high-order linear dynamics or unconstrained nonlinear dynamics, the adaptive containment control problem of multi-agent systems with high-order nonlinear dynamics and state constraints is resolved in this paper. Based on the finite-time Lyapunov stability theory, a finite-time distributed observer is first designed to estimate the information of leaders. Subsequently, by employing the backstepping technique, novel finite-time adaptive containment controllers are constructed to drive followers into a small neighborhood of the convex hull defined by the output of leaders within finite time, while rigorously maintaining all system states inside predefined bounded regions. Finally, theoretical findings are verified through illustrative numerical results.