Output Regulation of Heterogeneous Multi-agent Systems: Kalman Geometric Design and Reinforcement Learning

Professor Frank Lewis

University of Texas Arlington

Abstract:

The interactions of dynamical systems communicating over a networked environment lead to intriguing synchronization behaviors with applications in Internet of Things, formations, satellite control, and human societal behaviors. This talk studies the geometry of multiple interacting heterogeneous multi-agent systems (MAS), where the agent dynamics may not be the same. The study of heterogeneous MAS is more complex than the well-studied homogeneous case where all agents have the same dynamics. A detailed geometric theory is given based on the Kalman geometric form decomposition. The output regulator equations are expressed in a new coordinate system that clearly reveals their structure. These new geometric ideas are used to design efficient reduced-order synchronizers that guarantee synchronization of the outputs of all agents to a leader’s output. It is shown that synchronization of heterogeneous MAS can be achieved if each agent has a mix of a dynamic synchronizer for the part of the leader’s dynamics that is not contained in the agent’s dynamics, and a static feedback synchronizer for the part that is. Furthermore, we give a unified approach to heterogeneous output regulation using several types of control structures, along with a simplified design procedure that applies for each case. We are able to solve the output regulator equations and design distributed controllers for heterogeneous MAS without knowing the agents’ dynamics by using techniques from Reinforcement Learning.

Speaker: 

Dr Frank L. Lewis is a Member of National Academy of Inventors. Fellow IEEE, Fellow IFAC, Fellow AAAS, Fellow U.K. Institute of Measurement & Control, PE Texas, and U.K. Chartered Engineer. He is a UTA Distinguished Scholar Professor, UTA Distinguished Teaching Professor, and Moncrief-O’Donnell Chair at The University of Texas at Arlington Research Institute, the Founding Member Mediterranean Control Association, Qian Ren Thousand Talents Consulting Professor at Northeastern University, Shenyang, China, and is ranked at position 84 worldwide, 62 in the USA, and 3 in Texas of all scientists in Computer Science and Electronics, by Guide2Research. Dr Lewis received his Bachelor's Degree in Physics/EE and MSEE at Rice University, MS in Aeronautical Engineering at Univ. W. Florida, Ph.D. at Georgia Tech. He works in feedback control, reinforcement learning, intelligent systems, and distributed control systems. Dr Lewis is the author of 7 U.S. patents, 410 journal papers, 426 conference papers, 20 books, 48 chapters, and 12 journal special issues. He received the Fulbright Research Award, NSF Research Initiation Grant, ASEE Terman Award, Int. Neural Network Soc. Gabor Award 2009, U.K. Inst. Measurement & Control Honeywell Field Engineering Medal 2009, AACC Ragazzini Education Award 2018, IEEE Computational Intelligence Society Neural Networks Pioneer Award 2012 and AIAA Intelligent Systems Award 2016. Dr Lewis is an IEEE Control Systems Society Distinguished Lecturer, Project 111 Professor at Northeastern University, China, Distinguished Foreign Scholar at Shanghai Jiaotong Universality, Southeastern University Nanjing, and Chongqing Univ. China, and received Outstanding Service Award from Dallas IEEE Section. He was selected as Engineer of the Year by Ft. Worth IEEE Section, and was listed in Ft. Worth Business Press Top 200 Leaders in Manufacturing. He also received the 2010 IEEE Region 5 Outstanding Engineering Educator Award and the 2010 UTA Graduate Dean’s Excellence in Doctoral Mentoring Award. Elected to UTA Academy of Distinguished Teachers 2012, and Texas Regents Outstanding Teaching Award 2013. He served on the NAE Committee on Space Station in 1995.