Leader-following consensus of non-linear multi-agent systems with jointly connected topology

The leader-following consensus of non-linear multi-agent systems is investigated in this study. The authors further study this problem without the assumption that the topology among followers is connected or fixed. Based on a representative general non-linear model, they address such a leader-following consensus issue from a new perspective and then obtain several basic criteria for the consensus of the non-linear multi-agent system. Simultaneously, the simplified conditions of its corresponding linear multi-agent systems for achieving consensus are derived. Finally, numerical examples are presented to verify the theoretical analysis.