Distributed model predictive control of vehicle platoons under switching communication topologies

Abstract This paper studies the control problem for vehicle platoons under switching communication topologies, where the Predecessor-Following (PF)-failure topology is allowed. Firstly, we design a local optimization problem for each vehicle by using the state information of itself and its neighbouring vehicles, and then present Algorithm 1 based on Distributed Model Predictive Control (DMPC). By constructing a common Lyapunov function defined by the joint neighbourhood set, we derive sufficient conditions with respect to the weight matrices in the open-loop optimization problem and the switching topologies for ensuring the stability of the closed-loop system under Algorithm 1. Furthermore, we propose Algorithm 2 by introducing novel constraints into the local optimization problem for each vehicle, which utilize shrinking historical position errors to cope with PF-link failures, such that the string stability of the vehicle platoon is ensured. Finally, numerical examples are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed DMPC algorithms for the vehicel platoon under switching communication topologies.