Seguimento de caminho por uma formação robô terrestre - robô aéreo

Abstract

This MSc thesis discusses the accomplishment of a path-following task by a formation of an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and an unmanned ground vehicle (UGV). The idea undergoing such application is that the UAV is coming back after delivering a package, and should land on the UGV, its reference base, which can be stopped or continuing to follow its route in a street or a road. A high-level controller is designed to guide the formation, based on the virtual structure paradigm, and includes an obstacle avoidance algorithm to take into account the possibility that the UGV, the reference for the formation, faces an obstacle in its path, such as another vehicle, for instance. After describing the proposed controller and the obstacle avoidance algorithm in details, simulated and experimental results are shown and discussed, which validate the proposed controller and obstacle avoidance algorithm.