COORDINATED LANDING OF A UAV ON A MOVABLE GROUND VEHICLE

Control Technique Allows for the Perfect Autonomous Landing

Unmanned vehicles and aircraft are steadily making the crossover from the lab into real environments. As these machines increase in sophistication it is only matter of course that they will begin to communicate with each other to complete joint tasks. The video below demonstrates a way to autonomously coordinate the landing of a UAV on top of a movable landing pad. The research and demonstration were carried out by engineers at the University of Waterloo in Canada.

The researchers designed a control technique whereby the flying quadcopter can communicate with the tank-like UGV to effect a perfect landing. According to the authors of the research “local controllers to feedback linearize the models are presented, and a joint decentralized controller is developed to coordinate a rendezvous for the two vehicles”. Their work also discusses examining and adjusting for time delays. Just recently the US Navy successfully showed the X-47B UAV could land on the deck of an aircraft carrier alongside manned planes. Coordinated action during training and combat missions will be the next big step for unmanned machines. The benefits of these advancements will undoubtedly transfer over into the civilian field, with great potential in the area of search and rescue.