Projection-based discrete-time consensus on the unit sphere

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Thunberg, Johan, Sidorenko, Galina
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Thunberg, Johan
Sidorenko, Galina
author_facet Thunberg, Johan
Sidorenko, Galina
contents We address discrete-time consensus on the Euclidean unit sphere. For this purpose we consider a distributed algorithm comprising the iterative projection of a conical combination of neighboring states. Neighborhoods are represented by a strongly connected directed graph, and the conical combinations are represented by a (non-negative) weight matrix with a zero structure corresponding to the graph. A first result mirrors earlier results for gradient flows. Under the assumptions that each diagonal element of the weight matrix is more than $\sqrt{2}$ larger than the sum of the other elements in the corresponding row, the sphere dimension is greater or equal to 2, and the graph, as well as the weight matrix, is symmetric, we show that the algorithm comprises gradient ascent, stable fixed points are consensus points, and the set of initial points for which the algorithm converges to a non-consensus fixed point has measure zero. The second result is that for the unit circle and a strongly connected graph or for any unit sphere with dimension greater than or equal to $1$ and the complete graph, only for a measure zero set of weight matrices there are fixed points for the algorithm which do not have consensus or antipodal configurations.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2601_11439
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Projection-based discrete-time consensus on the unit sphere
Thunberg, Johan
Sidorenko, Galina
Optimization and Control
Systems and Control
We address discrete-time consensus on the Euclidean unit sphere. For this purpose we consider a distributed algorithm comprising the iterative projection of a conical combination of neighboring states. Neighborhoods are represented by a strongly connected directed graph, and the conical combinations are represented by a (non-negative) weight matrix with a zero structure corresponding to the graph. A first result mirrors earlier results for gradient flows. Under the assumptions that each diagonal element of the weight matrix is more than $\sqrt{2}$ larger than the sum of the other elements in the corresponding row, the sphere dimension is greater or equal to 2, and the graph, as well as the weight matrix, is symmetric, we show that the algorithm comprises gradient ascent, stable fixed points are consensus points, and the set of initial points for which the algorithm converges to a non-consensus fixed point has measure zero. The second result is that for the unit circle and a strongly connected graph or for any unit sphere with dimension greater than or equal to $1$ and the complete graph, only for a measure zero set of weight matrices there are fixed points for the algorithm which do not have consensus or antipodal configurations.
title Projection-based discrete-time consensus on the unit sphere
topic Optimization and Control
Systems and Control
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.11439