Swarm formation control utilizing ground and aerial unmanned systems

This work addresses the problem of coordinating a swarm of unmanned ground vehicles with an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV). The UAV is utilized as a leader robot that is intelligently followed by a coordinated group of unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs). The UAV is a completely autonomous agent that is controlled using Sugueno fuzzy logic. The UGVs are organized into formation utilizing artificial potential fields generated from normal and sigmoid functions. These functions are built around the location of the UAV and ultimately construct the surface that swarm members travel on, which inherently controls the overall swarm geometry and the individual member spacing. Nonlinear limiting functions are defined to provide tighter swarm control by modifying and adjusting a set of control variables forcing the swarm to behave according to set constraints, formation and member spacing. The swarm function and limiting functions are combined to control swarm formation, orientation, and swarm movement as a whole. Parameters are chosen based on desired formation as well as user defined constraints. Simulations demonstrate the precision of the approach with up to forty UGVs. Experimental results are presented using a fully autonomous swarm of three UGVs and a single UAV helicopter for coordination.