Coordinated vehicle platoon control: Weighted and constrained consensus and communication network topologies

This paper introduces a new method for enhancing highway safety and efficiency by coordinated control of vehicle platoons. One of our aims is to understand influence of communication network topologies and uncertainties on control performance. Vehicle deployment is formulated as a weighted and constrained consensus control problem. Algorithms are introduced and their convergence properties are established. The main advantages of the methods are demonstrated, including using local control to achieve a global deployment so that communication complexity is reduced; scalability to accommodate dynamic changes of the member vehicles and communication networks; robustness against road conditions and communication uncertainties.