A Novel Null-Space-Based UAV Trajectory Tracking Controller With Collision Avoidance

A new trajectory tracking controller with collision avoidance is proposed in this paper for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) navigation. A positive potential function is designed to take into account the movement of obstacles. Thus, the controller with potential function guarantees that the UAV moves through areas of potentials close to zero to ensure safe navigation in dynamic and unknown environments. Such a controller was designed with hierarchical objectives using a behavioral-based approach. A null-space-based controller is adopted, whose main objective is to ensure that the collision avoidance is achieved, whereas other objectives are projected onto the null space. Collision avoidance and trajectory tracking controllers generate reference velocities sent to a dynamic compensator to guarantee the tracking of such velocities, thus characterizing a cascade controller. Stability of the entire closed-loop nonlinear system is demonstrated through Lyapunov's theory. A low-cost indoor framework with just one RGB-D sensor, which is a combination of a RGB (red-green-blue) camera with a depth sensor based on infrared light was used to estimate the positions of the UAV and obstacles. Simulation and experiments are run using a Parrot AR.Drone quadrotor and considering a person as a dynamic obstacle for an AR.Drone quadrotor, and some of their results are reported to validate the proposed controller.

I. Introduction

Aerial robotics is a growing field of diverse civil and military applications. Potential applications for micro unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) include search and rescue tasks, environmental monitoring, aerial transportation/manipulation, and surveillance [1]. Low-cost and small-size flying platforms are becoming broadly available, and some of these platforms are capable of lifting relatively heavy payloads and of providing an increasing range of basic functionalities [2].