Rigidity-Aware Formation Tracking under Sensing Range Constraints via Single Control Barrier Function Constraint

Abstract

This paper presents a control framework for formation tracking and rigidity maintenance in heterogeneous multi-robot systems with nonlinear dynamics under sensing range constraints. Since formation tracking alone does not ensure rigidity maintenance with a limited sensing range, despite rigidity being a prerequisite for establishing and preserving a unique formation, our work integrates both objectives through a single Control Barrier Function (CBF)-like constraint within a quadratic optimization framework. The proposed distributed controller requires only local relative information from neighbors, as verified with simulation case studies.