Subject: Distributed Average Tracking and Continuous-time Optimization in Multi-agent Networks

Speaker: Prof. Wei Ren

Time: 9:00am, 3rd Nov, 2020

Place: https://meeting.tencent.com/s/JN9eQSy9hbmj(Tencent Meeting ID: 190 494 620)

Abstract:

 In this talk, we introduce a distributed average tracking problem and present distributed discontinuous control algorithms to solve the problem. The idea of distributed average tracking is that multiple agents track the average of multiple time-varying reference signals in a distributed manner based only on local information and local communication with adjacent neighbors. We study the cases where the time-varying reference signals have bounded derivatives and accelerations. We also use the distributed average tracking idea to solve a continuous-time distributed convex optimization problem. Tools from nonsmooth analysis are used to analyze the stability of the systems. Simulation and experimental results are presented to show the validity of the theoretical results.

About the speaker:

Wei Ren is currently a Professor with the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of California, Riverside. He received the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from Brigham Young University, Provo, UT, in 2004. Prior to joining UC Riverside, he was a faculty member at Utah State University and a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Maryland, College Park. His research focuses on distributed control of multi-agent systems and autonomous control of unmanned vehicles. Dr. Ren was a recipient of the IEEE Control Systems Society Antonio Ruberti Young Researcher Prize in 2017 and the National Science Foundation CAREER Award in 2008. He is an IEEE Fellow and an IEEE Control Systems Society Distinguished Lecturer. He is an Associate Editor for Automatica and IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control.