An Elasticity Inspired method for multi-AUVs formation control using range-only measurements

Multi-AUVs formation control has received a lot of theoretical research achievements during the past ten years. Recent researches pay more attention to the application-oriented problems such as communication constraints, range-only measurements, actural mission restrictions and so on. Particularly the range-only measurements is a general problem for AUV because it is more difficult to measure relative orientation or to deliver location information in real time than to measure relative distance through acoustic sensor. In response to this problem, this paper discusses three AUVs formation in which each AUV can only measure the relative distances of the other AUVs and presents a novel method named by Elasticity Inspired (ELASI) Method. The performance of the proposed formation controller is verified by numerical simulations.