Aerial cooperative transporting and assembling control using multiple quadrotor–manipulator systems

ABSTRACT

In this paper, a fully distributed control scheme for aerial cooperative transporting and assembling is proposed using multiple quadrotor–manipulator systems with each quadrotor equipped with a robotic manipulator. First, the kinematic and dynamic models of a quadrotor with multi-Degree of Freedom (DOF) robotic manipulator are established together using Euler–Lagrange equations. Based on the aggregated dynamic model, the control scheme consisting of position controller, attitude controller and manipulator controller is presented. Regarding cooperative transporting and assembling, multiple quadrotor–manipulator systems should be able to form a desired formation without collision among quadrotors from any initial position. The desired formation is achieved by the distributed position controller and attitude controller, while the collision avoidance is guaranteed by an artificial potential function method. Then, the transporting and assembling tasks request the manipulators to reach the desired angles cooperatively, which is achieved by the distributed manipulator controller. The overall stability of the closed-loop system is proven by a Lyapunov method and Matrosov's theorem. In the end, the proposed control scheme is simplified for the real application and then validated by two formation flying missions of four quadrotors with 2-DOF manipulators.

KEYWORDS:

• Cooperative control
• robotics
• collision avoidance
• quadrotors
• aerial transporting and assembling

Acknowledgments

The authors highly appreciate the associate editor and reviewer' great efforts in reviewing our manuscript and for providing many helpful comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China [Grant No. 61503025 and 61503333].

Notes on contributors

Yuhua Qi

Yuhua Qi received his B.S. degree from Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing China, in 2010. He is currently a Ph.D. candidate at Beijing Institute of Technology. His research interests include cooperative control and autonomous UAV systems.

Jianan Wang

Jianan Wang is currently an Associate Professor in the School of Aerospace Engineering at Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China. He received his B.S. and M.S. in Control Science and Engineering from the Beijing Jiaotong University and Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China, in 2004 and 2007, respectively. He received his Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering at Mississippi State University, Starkville, MS, USA in 2011. His research interests include cooperative control of multiple dynamic systems, UAV formation control, obstacle/collision avoidance, trustworthy networked system, and estimation of sensor networks. He is a senior member of IEEE and AIAA.

Jiayuan Shan

Jiayuan Shan received the B.S. degree from Huazhong University of Science and Technology in 1988, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Beijing Institute of Technology, in 1991 and 1999, respectively. He is currently a Professor at Beijing Institute of Technology. His research interests include guidance, navigation and control of the aircraft and hardware-in-the-loop simulation. He is the Director of Department of Flight Vehicles Control and the Deputy Director of Flight Dynamics and Control Key Laboratory of Ministry of Education.