Robust-formation control of multi-autonomous underwater vehicles based on consensus algorithm

Abstract

This paper discusses a robust formation control for multi-Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs). The AUVs are disturbed by exogenous perturbation during the mission, thus, the Robust Integral Sign of Error (RISE) is adopted. For a formation control, a leader-follower structure based on consensus algorithm is adopted and the use of graph theorem named connected graph is useful to exchange the required information. An AUV called leader is determined to bring a group of information, while the others called followers, receive the information from a leader. Lyapunov analysis proves the stability as well as the error convergence of proposed controller, whilst some simulations are performed to compare between the proposed controller, RISE with consensus, and the existing robust controller, Sliding Mode Controller (SMC) which is combined with consensus algorithm. As a result, the proposed controller works better and produces smaller error.