Consensus of heterogeneous multi-agent systems with switching jointly-connected interconnection

•We give a new method to investigate the consensus problem.•We give a new model transformation.•We give a new consensus condition for heterogeneous multi-agent systems.•Consensus can be achieved when the feedback gain of velocity is large enough.•The realization of consensus is unrelated to the feedback gain of position.

In this paper, the consensus problem of heterogeneous multi-agent systems with switching jointly-connected interconnection and a leader is considered. Firstly, by a model transformation, the original closed-loop system is turned into an equivalent system. And then, by applying the matrix theory and Lyapunov directed method, the convergence of the multi-agent systems is analyzed, a sufficient condition for consensus of systems is derived when the communication topologies are jointly-connected. Finally, simulation results are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of presented results.