Distributed Obstacles Avoidance For UAVs Formation Using Consensus-based Switching Topology

Abstract

Nowadays, most of the recent researches are focusing on the use of multi-UAVs in both civil and military applications. Multiple robots can offer many advantages compared to a single one such as reliability, time decreasing and various simultaneous interventions. However, solving the formation control and obstacles avoidance problems is still a big challenge. This paper proposes a distributed strategy for UAVs formation control and obstacles avoidance using a consensus-based switching topology. This novel approach allows UAVs to keep the desired topology and switch it in the event of avoiding obstacles. A double loop control structure is designed using a backstepping controller for tracking of the reference path, while a Sliding Mode Controller (SMC) is adopted for formation control. Furthermore, collaborative obstacles avoidance is assured by switching the swarm topology. Numerical simulations show the efficiency of the proposed strategy.

Distributed Robust Formation Control of Heterogeneous Multi-UAVs With Disturbance Rejection

“…Leader-follower formation control for multi-UAVs was developed in [35] without linearizing the nonlinear dynamics. However, the challenging parts of cooperative control problems were avoided, where all followers connected to the leader.…”