Disturbance Observer Based Trajectory Tracking Control for the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

This article develops a disturbance observer (DO) based controller for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) trajectory tracking subject to external disturbances. In particular, an observer is constructed to estimate the time- varying disturbances. Then, the estimated disturbances are incorporated to design the trajectory tracking controller, which can realize the steady trajectory tracking of the UAV under external disturbances. The stability of the proposed controller is analyzed using Lyapunov technology. Finally, the tracking performance is compared with another controller through simulation experiments. The results illustrate the superior tracking performance of the proposed controller in terms of the position and yaw angle profiles.