Synchronization of Networked Nonlinear Dynamics Using Leader-Follower Topologies with Optimized Diffusive Coupling

The paper addresses the task of efficient synchronization for networked nonlinear identical systems via optimized output diffusive coupling. Under the assumption that the local dynamics are strictly input-output semi-passive, a sufficient condition to ensure synchronization for heterogeneous coupling gains is proposed, taking the network topology into account. Compared to previous work, which commonly adopts the same coupling gain over the network, the proposed technique uses a leader-follower structure together with optimization of gains to significantly reduce the overall effort of coupling. The effectiveness of the proposed method is shown for different numeric examples.