On the Robustness of a Distributed Adaptive Synchronization Protocol for Connected Autonomous Vehicles with Multiple Disturbances and Communication Delays

his paper addresses the robust cooperative leader tracking problem for a platoon of connected autonomous vehicles in the presence of both multiple Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) time-varying communication delays and external disturbances. To tackle this issue, a distributed adaptive protocol is proposed, that exploits shared information among connected vehicles to achieve leader synchronization. The robust stability of the closed-loop delayed network is proven via Lyapunov-Krasovskii theory. Delay-dependent linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) conditions are analytically derived for ensuring both robust synchronization to the leader dynamics and disturbances attenuation. An exemplar driving maneuver is considered for evaluating the robustness of the performance achieved by vehicles platoon and the numerical results confirm the effectiveness of the theoretical derivation.