A Practical Visual Servo Control for an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

An image-based visual servo control is presented for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) capable of stationary or quasi-stationary flight with the camera mounted onboard the vehicle. The target considered consists of a finite set of stationary and disjoint points lying in a plane. Control of the position and orientation dynamics is decoupled using a visual error based on spherical centroid data, along with estimations of the linear velocity and the gravitational inertial direction extracted from image features and an embedded inertial measurement unit. The visual error used compensates for poor conditioning of the image Jacobian matrix by introducing a nonhomogeneous gain term adapted to the visual sensitivity of the error measurements. A nonlinear controller, that ensures exponential convergence of the system considered, is derived for the full dynamics of the system using control Lyapunov function design techniques. Experimental results on a quadrotor UAV, developed by the French Atomic Energy Commission, demonstrate the robustness and performance of the proposed control strategy.     

State transformation-based dynamic visual servoing for an unmanned aerial vehicle

In this paper, we propose a visual servoing control for a quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) which is based on a state transformation technique. The UAV is equipped with a single downwards facing camera, and the motion control objective is the regulation of relative displacement and yaw to a stationary visual target located on the ground. The state transformation is defined by a system of partial differential equations (PDEs) which eliminate roll and pitch rate dependence in the transformed image feature kinematics. A method for computing the general solutions of these PDEs is given, and we show a particular solution reduces to an established virtual camera approach. We treat point and line cases and introduce image moment features defined in the virtual camera image plane. Robustness of the control design is improved by accounting for attitude measurement bias, and uncertainty in thrust gain, mass, and image feature depth. The asymptotic stability of the closed-loop is proven. The method is based on a simple proportional-integral-derivative (PID) structure which can be readily implemented on-board. Experimental results show improved performance relative to previous work.     

四旋翼无人机姿态系统的非线性容错控制设计

本文研究了四旋翼无人机执行器发生部分失效时的姿态控制问题.通过分析其动力学特性,将执行器故障以乘性因子加入系统模型,得到执行器故障情况下四旋翼无人机的姿态动力学模型.在同时存在未知外部扰动和执行器故障的情况下,设计了一种基于自适应滑模控制的容错控制器.利用基于Lyapunov的分析方法证明了所设计控制器的渐近稳定性.在四旋翼无人机实验平台上进行了实验,验证了该算法对存在未知外部扰动和执行器部分失效时四旋翼无人机的姿态控制具有较好的鲁棒性.     

Stable camera position control of unmanned aerial vehicle with three‐degree‐of‐freedom manipulator for visual test of bridge inspection

This paper describes a camera position control with aerial manipulator for visual test of bridge inspection. Our developed unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) has three‐degree‐of‐freedom (3‐DoF) manipulator on its top to execute visual or hammering test of the inspection. This paper focuses on the visual test. A camera was implemented at the end of the manipulator to acquire images of the narrow space of the bridge such as bearings, which the conventional UAV without the camera‐attached manipulators at its top cannot achieve the fine visual test. For the visual test, it is desirable that the camera is above the body with enough distance between the camera and the body. As obvious, the camera position in the inertial coordinate system is effected by the movement of the body. Therefore we implement the camera position control compensating the body movement into the UAV. As a result of an experiment, it is assessed that the proposed control reduces the position error of the camera comparing the one of the body. The mean position error of the camera is 0.039 m that is 51.4% of the one of the body. Our world‐first study enables to acquire the image of the bearing of the bridge by a camera mounted at the end effector of aerial manipulator fixed on UAV.     

Tracking a Ground Moving Target with a Quadrotor Using Switching Control

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) stabilization strategy based on computer vision and switching controllers is proposed. The main goal of this system is to perform tracking of a moving target on ground. The architecture implemented consists of a quadrotor equipped with an embedded camera which provides real-time video to a computer vision algorithm where images are processed. A vision-based estimator is proposed, which makes use of 2-dimensional images to compute the relative 3-dimensional position and translational velocity of the UAV with respect to the target. The proposed estimator provides the required states measurements to a micro-controller for stabilizing the vehicle during flight. The control strategy consists of switching controllers, which allows making decisions when the target is lost temporarily or when it is out of the camera’s field of view. Real time experiments are presented to demonstrate the performance of the target-tracking system proposed.     

一套完整的基于视觉光流和激光扫描测距的室内无人机导航系统

提出了一套室内四旋翼无人机控制, 导航, 定位和地图构建的完整解决方案. 无人机机载系统包括三个主要传感器, 即惯性测量单元, 下视相机和激光扫描测距仪. 经过处理, 融合这些传感器的测量数据, 无人机能够可靠的估计自己的飞行速度和实时位置, 并且沿着室内的墙壁进行无碰撞飞行. 通过收集一个完整飞行实验的数据, 无人机的飞行路径和在室内的环境也可以被很好地估计出来. 这套系统中的自主导功能不需要任何远程传感信息或脱机计算能力. 这套室内导航方案的性能和可靠性已在实际的飞行实验中被验证.     

垂直起降无人机基于图像的目标跟踪控制

针对安装有惯性测量单元和摄像机的低成本四旋翼无人机,研究无位置、速度、航向测量情况下的机动目标基于图像的跟踪控制方法.首先,结合无人机的动力学方程在图像空间中推导了系统的误差方程.其次,为克服无航向测量的问题,设计了一种位置控制器,使用图像矩作为反馈输入并输出油门和姿态指令.最后,针对缺少图像速度测量问题,设计了一种super-twisting滑模观测器和控制器,生成的期望姿态和拉力指令无颤振,并通过李雅普诺夫理论证明了控制系统的稳定性.最终无人机通过调整倾斜姿态实现了跟踪飞行,且避免了响应慢的航向调整.跟踪机动目标的仿真结果验证了所提出方法的有效性.     

Nonlinear Robust Tracking Control of a Quadrotor UAV on SE(3)

This paper provides nonlinear tracking control systems for a quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that are robust to bounded uncertainties. A mathematical model of a quadrotor UAV is defined on the special Euclidean group, and nonlinear output‐tracking controllers are developed to follow (i) an attitude command, and (ii) a position command for the vehicle center of mass. The controlled system has the desirable properties that the tracking errors are uniformly ultimately bounded, and the size of the ultimate bound can be reduced arbitrarily by control system parameters. Numerical examples illustrating complex maneuvers are provided.     

无人机吊挂飞行系统的减摆控制设计

主要考虑了四旋翼无人机（Unmanned aerial vehicle,UAV）吊挂飞行系统的位置控制及负载摆动抑制的设计问题.在存在欠驱动特性以及未知系统参数的约束下,本文基于能量法设计了一种非线性控制策略,实现了对无人机位置的精确控制和飞行过程中负载摆动的快速抑制.基于Lyapunov方法的稳定性分析证明了闭环系统的稳定性,位置误差的收敛及摆动的抑制.实验结果表明本文提出的控制策略取得了较好的控制效果.     

Visual Object Tracking and Servoing Control of a Nano-Scale Quadrotor: System,Algorithms, and Experiments

There are two main trends in the development of unmanned aerial vehicle(UAV)technologies:miniaturization and intellectualization,in which realizing object tracking capabilities for a nano-scale UAV is one of the most challenging problems.In this paper,we present a visual object tracking and servoing control system utilizing a tailor-made 38 g nano-scale quadrotor.A lightweight visual module is integrated to enable object tracking capabilities,and a micro positioning deck is mounted to provide accurate pose estimation.In order to be robust against object appearance variations,a novel object tracking algorithm,denoted by RMCTer,is proposed,which integrates a powerful short-term tracking module and an efficient long-term processing module.In particular,the long-term processing module can provide additional object information and modify the short-term tracking model in a timely manner.Furthermore,a positionbased visual servoing control method is proposed for the quadrotor,where an adaptive tracking controller is designed by leveraging backstepping and adaptive techniques.Stable and accurate object tracking is achieved even under disturbances.Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the high accuracy and stability of the whole tracking system.     

无人机吊挂飞行的非线性控制方法设计

针对四旋翼无人机吊挂飞行系统,本文设计了一种新型控制策略.本文首先建立了四旋翼无人机吊挂系统的数学模型.其中负载被看作由刚性绳悬挂在四旋翼无人机重心位置的质点.之后本文通过能量分析的方法设计了针对此系统的非线性控制器.本文提出的控制方法可以在抑制吊挂负载摆动的同时将四旋翼无人机移动到目标位置.本文运用李雅普诺夫稳定性分析和拉塞尔不变性原理对闭环系统的稳定性进行了证明.最后,通过数值仿真,分别将本控制器镇定控制和调节控制的控制效果与线性二次调节器(linear-quadratic regulator,LQR)控制器进行了对比.     

平面四旋翼无人飞行器运送系统的轨迹规划与跟踪控制器设计

对于四旋翼无人飞行器运送系统而言,需要保证飞行过程中负载的摆幅维持在适当的范围内,并且在飞行器到达目的地后负载无残余摆动.本文针对四旋翼无人飞行器运送系统,提出了一种新颖的轨迹规划与跟踪控制方法.论文首先得到了平面四旋翼无人飞行器的运动特性与负载摆角之间的非线性耦合关系.通过相平面内的几何分析,分别设计了两个轴方向上的分段式加速度轨迹.这种轨迹具有简洁的解析表达式并可获得较高的运送效率,同时满足飞行器的速度,加速度等物理约束.为了使四旋翼无人飞行器准确跟踪规划好的轨迹,本文基于反步法设计了一种非线性跟踪控制器,并通过李雅普诺夫方法对其闭环稳定性进行分析,证明其能使跟踪误差指数收敛于零.论文最后通过仿真结果验证了本文所提出方法的可行性与有效性,及其对外界干扰的鲁棒性.     

Automatic Take Off, Tracking and Landing of a Miniature UAV on a Moving Carrier Vehicle

We present a system consisting of a miniature unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and a small carrier vehicle, in which the UAV is capable of autonomously starting from the moving ground vehicle, tracking it at a constant distance and landing on a platform on the carrier in motion. Our visual tracking approach differs from other methods by using low-cost, lightweight commodity consumer hardware. As main sensor we use a Wii remote infrared (IR) camera, which allows robust tracking of a pattern of IR lights in conditions without direct sunlight. The system does not need to communicate with the ground vehicle and works with an onboard 8-bit microcontroller. Nevertheless the position and orientation relative to the IR pattern is estimated at a frequency of approximately 50 Hz. This enables the UAV to fly fully autonomously, performing flight control, self-stabilisation and visual tracking of the ground vehicle. We present experiments in which our UAV performs autonomous flights with a moving ground carrier describing a circular path and where the carrier is rotating. The system provides small errors and allows for safe, autonomous indoor flights.     

Bounded‐Input Control of the Quadrotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicle: A Vision‐Based Approach

In this paper, a bounded‐input controller is designed for the quadrotor vertical take‐off and landing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). Visual information is used to localize the aircraft with respect to its environment and an image‐based visual servo scheme is developed to navigate the motion of it. The visual features are selected from perspective image moments and projected on a rotated image plane, which simplifies the controller design. The flow of the features is used as the linear velocity information, and the controller assumes angular velocity and attitude information available for feedback. To design the controller, the dynamics of the quadrotor are decoupled into two parts: translational dynamics and rotational dynamics. First visual data are used to design a bounded‐input controller for the translational dynamics, and then a saturated controller is designed for the rotational dynamics. The boundedness of the controller increases the chance of keeping the visual features in the field of view of the camera. Furthermore, the controllers also cope with the unknown depth of the image, and the external disturbances. The complete stability analysis of the overall system is presented to show that all states are bounded and the error signals converge to zero asymptotically. Simulation examples are provided in both nominal and perturbed conditions which show the effectiveness of the proposed theoretical results.     

Guidance and nonlinear control system for autonomous flight of minirotorcraft unmanned aerial vehicles

Small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are becoming popular among researchers and vital platforms for several autonomous mission systems. In this paper, we present the design and development of a miniature autonomous rotorcraft weighing less than 700 g and capable of waypoint navigation, trajectory tracking, visual navigation, precise hovering, and automatic takeoff and landing. In an effort to make advanced autonomous behaviors available to mini‐ and microrotorcraft, an embedded and inexpensive autopilot was developed. To compensate for the weaknesses of the low‐cost equipment, we put our efforts into designing a reliable model‐based nonlinear controller that uses an inner‐loop outer‐loop control scheme. The developed flight controller considers the system's nonlinearities, guarantees the stability of the closed‐loop system, and results in a practical controller that is easy to implement and to tune. In addition to controller design and stability analysis, the paper provides information about the overall control architecture and the UAV system integration, including guidance laws, navigation algorithms, control system implementation, and autopilot hardware. The guidance, navigation, and control (GN&C) algorithms were implemented on a miniature quadrotor UAV that has undergone an extensive program of flight tests, resulting in various flight behaviors under autonomous control from takeoff to landing. Experimental results that demonstrate the operation of the GN&C algorithms and the capabilities of our autonomous micro air vehicle are presented. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Vision-Based Odometry and SLAM for Medium and High Altitude Flying UAVs

This paper proposes vision-based techniques for localizing an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) by means of an on-board camera. Only natural landmarks provided by a feature tracking algorithm will be considered, without the help of visual beacons or landmarks with known positions. First, it is described a monocular visual odometer which could be used as a backup system when the accuracy of GPS is reduced to critical levels. Homography-based techniques are used to compute the UAV relative translation and rotation by means of the images gathered by an onboard camera. The analysis of the problem takes into account the stochastic nature of the estimation and practical implementation issues. The visual odometer is then integrated into a simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) scheme in order to reduce the impact of cumulative errors in odometry-based position estimation approaches. Novel prediction and landmark initialization for SLAM in UAVs are presented. The paper is supported by an extensive experimental work where the proposed algorithms have been tested and validated using real UAVs.     

Standoff Tracking of a Moving Target for Quadrotor Using Lyapunov Potential Function

International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems - This paper presents a control scheme for standoff tracking of a ground moving target by a quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The...     

四旋翼无人机飞控系统的研究与实现

本文通过数学建模进行动力学系统分析,研究实现了基于硬件和软件的四旋翼无人机飞控系统。首先、构建了四旋翼无人机动力学模型并进行理论分析;其次、设计了无人机机架,对各组成模块进行测试、分析和试验;再次、通过集成软硬件实现了无人机飞控系统并进行飞行测试;最后、实验结果表明,实现的无人机飞控系统取得了较好的飞控效果,具有灵敏性强、稳定性高,总体性能优良等优点。     

Adaptive fractional-order nonsingular fast terminal sliding mode formation control of multiple quadrotor UAVs-based distributed estimator

This paper mainly solves two major problems that are unavoidable in leader–follower formation process of quadrotor UAV group: the existence of external uncertainty disturbance and communication limited between quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) group. To solve the problem that only one of the followers in the leader–follower formation can obtain the leader's information, an improved distributed estimator is proposed in this paper, which can accurately estimate the leader's information for each follower. In addition, in order to eliminate the influence of uncertain external disturbance on the performance of quadrotor UAV, an adaptive estimation law is designed based only on velocity and position variables. For the attitude and position subsystem of the quadrotor UAV, a sliding surface with fractional-order term is designed. Which makes the quadrotor UAV tracking error system obtain good robustness at the stage of reaching the sliding surface and fast convergence and accurate tracking performance in the sliding stage. Based on Lyapunov stability theory, the convergence results are analyzed strictly. The results show that the algorithm can make the position distance between leader and followers converge to the desired offset. Simulation results verify the effectiveness and superiority of the control algorithm.     

四旋翼无人机可视化轨迹跟踪仿真系统

为了便于对四旋翼无人机控制算法进行实验仿真和验证,联合Solidworks和Matlab/SimMechanics工具箱设计了一种四旋翼无人机可视化轨迹跟踪仿真系统;利用Solidworks搭建了四旋翼无人机三维实体模型,并通过Solidworks和Matlab转换接口将该实体模型导入到Matlab/SimMechanics中;Matlab/SimMechanics提供了了三维可视化窗口,可以显示无人机的实时仿真状态;仿真平台在Matlab/SimMechanics环境中实现,与Matlab/Simulink通信方便,可方便的将Simulink设计好的控制算法添加到仿真系统中,以进行验证和参数整定,还具有姿态分析和数据分析等功能;轨迹跟踪仿真结果表明,四旋翼无人机可视化轨迹跟踪仿真系统直观可视,准确可靠,能较好地对控制算法进行研究和测试,对四旋翼无人机以及控制算法的研究和开发具有重要价值。