This paper considers the consensus problem of third-order nonlinear multi-agent systems with a fixed communication topology. A consensus protocol is proposed for solving such a problem. By a transformation, the consensus problem is converted to a stability problem, then sufficient consensus criteria are obtained by proposing a novel Lyapunov function. It is shown that consensus can be achieved for a sufficiently large feedback gain, provided that certain quadratic inequalities with respect to two parameters are satisfied. Finally, the effectiveness of the theoretical results is demonstrated through an example.

Multi-agent systems; Consensus; Synchronization; Third-order nonlinear systems

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