Non-hierarchical UAV formation control for surveillance tasks

In this paper, we consider motion and formation control of a team of three unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for a particular surveillance task. The UAVs are required to fly in an equilateral triangle formation (to optimize target location estimation accuracy), with the centre of mass following a nominated (spiral) trajectory, which reflects the constraints on the turning radius of the flight paths. Furthermore, the UAVs need to fly at constant and nearly (but not necessarily exactly) the same speeds. A decentralized control scheme is designed and analyzed for the above motion and formation control tasks, based on a non-hierarchical (i.e. three-coleader) sensing/control structure.