Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: While networked multi-agent systems have been widely explored, the challenges introduced by underactuation still impede safety-critical cooperative control of multiple underactuated manipulators. This paper introduces a distributed framework for end-effector formation control and obstacle avoidance in planar n-link manipulators with a passive first joint and active remaining joints—termed PAn−1 manipulators. By exploiting the integrability of each PAn−1 manipulator’s second-order nonholonomic constraint, we reformulate the dynamics into a cascaded structure and derive a reduced-order model driven solely by active joint velocities. Building on this reduced-order model, we design safety-critical distributed formation control laws for the reduced-order dynamics, which serve as the manipulators’ desired active joint velocities. Then, we employ the backstepping method to obtain control inputs for the full-order dynamics. To guarantee safety, we treat backstepping tracking errors as matched disturbances and address them within a robust control barrier function framework. Numerical simulations and comparative studies confirm the effectiveness of the proposed approach.
Source: Actuators
DOI: 10.3390/act14100475
Authors: Zhiyu Peng, Xin Xin
Institution: Southeast University
Language: English
Subfield: Computer Networks and Communications
Field: Computer Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $2,896
Awards: G363425310, G964984314
OpenAlex ID: W4414629344