Formation control of fixed-wing UAVs with communication delay

Area of Science:

• Robotics and Control Systems
• Aerospace Engineering
• Networked Systems

Background:

• Fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) offer high-speed reconnaissance capabilities.
• Maintaining formation control in UAVs is challenging due to communication delays.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a robust formation control strategy for fixed-wing UAVs under communication delays.
• To ensure UAVs maintain a predefined geometric formation accurately.

Main Methods:

• A leader-follower control law is proposed for the non-holonomic kinematic model.
• Lyapunov-Krasovskii functions are used for stability analysis with communication delay.
• A prediction algorithm is developed to forecast UAV positions.

Main Results:

• The proposed control law ensures stable formation maintenance despite communication delays.
• The prediction algorithm effectively compensates for communication delay impacts on formation accuracy.
• Theoretical findings are validated through digital simulations and hardware-in-loop experiments.

Conclusions:

• The leader-follower approach with a prediction algorithm is effective for delayed communication formation control in fixed-wing UAVs.
• The method enhances formation stability and accuracy for reconnaissance missions.