Control of coordinated patterns for ocean sampling

Abstract

A class of underwater vehicles are modelled as Newtonian particles for navigation and control. We show a general method that controls cooperative Newtonian particles to generate patterns on closed smooth curves. These patterns are chosen for good sampling performance using mobile sensor networks. We measure the spacing between neighbouring particles by the relative curve phase along the curve. The distance between a particle and the desired curve is measured using an orbit function. The orbit value and the relative curve phase are then used as feedback to control motion of each particle. From an arbitrary initial configuration, the particles converge asymptotically to form an invariant pattern on the desired curves. We describe application of this method to control underwater gliders in a field experiment in Buzzards Bay, MA in March 2006.

Acknowledgement

The authors want to thank R. E. Davis for discussions on controlling underwater gliders for adaptive sampling, I. Shulman and P. Lermusiaux for discussions and sharing ocean model fields and J. Pinner for discussions and help with simulation software. This work was supported in part by ONR grants N00014-02-1-0826, N00014-02-1-0861 and N00014-04-1-0534.