Estimation and Control for Collective Motion with Intermittent Locomotion

Inspired by the periodic swimming of many fish species, this paper presents a dynamic model of self-propelled particles with a periodic controller. The dynamics are split into a burst phase during which each particle applies a control input and a coast phase during which each particle performs state estimation. Using a closed-loop heading controller and a linear observer, we evaluate conditions that stabilize the equilibrium points for a single particle and for multiple particles using noise-free state feedback or output feedback. Practical stability bounds are evaluated for a single particle with bounded actuator noise with state feedback and bounded sensor noise with output feedback.