A Novel Concept for Stratospheric Communications and Surveillance: The StarLight

Chu, Adam; Blackmore, Mo; Oholendt, Ronald G.; Welch, Joseph V.; Baird, Gil; Cadogan, David; Scarborough, Stephen

doi:10.2514/6.2007-2601

Cited by 30 publications

(12 citation statements)

References 7 publications

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“…Stratospheric airship, as a novel type of unmanned aerial vehicle with great potentials in surveillance, emergency communications and environmental observation, has garnered considerable attention from scientists to engineers of many fields in recent years [1], [2]. Similar to the balloon [3], stratospheric airship gains the lift force through the use of a buoyant gas rather than aerodynamic force, which makes the airship possess longer endurance than the conventional aircraft.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trajectory Tracking Control for a Stratospheric Airship Subject to Constraints and Unknown Disturbances

et al. 2020

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This paper addresses the spatial trajectory tracking problem for a stratospheric airship with state constraints, input saturation and unknown disturbances. First, a Laguerre-based model predictive kinematic controller (LMPC) is proposed to tackle the state constraints and generate the desired velocity signal. To reduce the complexity of online optimization, Laguerre functions are applied to decrease the number of optimization variables by approximating the predicted control sequence. Second, in the dynamic loop, a sliding mode controller (SMC) with fast power rate reaching law (FPRRL) is introduced to track the desired velocity signal. The unknown disturbances in the dynamic model of airship are estimated and compensated by reduced-order extended state observer (ESO). An anti-windup compensator is incorporated into the FPRRL-based SMC controller to deal with the input saturation. Stability analysis implies that the tracking errors converge to a small neighborhood of zero. Comparative simulations about spatial straight and curve trajectory tracking are provided to evaluate the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed control scheme. INDEX TERMS Input saturation, model predictive control, state constraints, stratospheric airship, trajectory tracking, unknown disturbances.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Trajectory Tracking Control for a Stratospheric Airship Subject to Constraints and Unknown Disturbances

et al. 2020

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“…There has been recent interest in near-space long duration vehicles motivated by the possibility of operating such vehicles with the relative benefits of both high-altitude aircrafts and low-altitude satellites [2]. The autonomous airship is a type of lighter-than-air vehicle that can be operated in near-space with some payloads and other durable systems, and is considered as a new platform that will support a great many missions such as telecommunication, broadcasting relays, region navigation, earth observation and surveillance.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dynamics modeing and maneuverability analysis of a near-space earth observation platform

Yang

Xie

et al. 2011

Proceedings of 5th International Conference on Recent Advances in Space Technologies - RAST2011

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Near-space autonomous airship represents a unique and promising platform for earth observation and surveillance that involve a long duration airborne presence. In this paper, a six-degrees-of-freedom dynamics model and maneuverability of a near-space earth observation platform are presented. First, the near-space earth observation platform is introduced, including the concept design, configuration, energy sources, propeller and payload. Second, reference frames and motion parameters of the platform are defined, and the kinematics equations describing the platform's dimensional motion are derived. The effects of gravity, buoyancy, added inertia, aerodynamics and thrust on the platform are incorporated into the dynamics analysis, and a dynamics model in vector form of the platform is derived based on Newton-Euler principle. Finally, a simulation program has been developed to implement the dynamics model and applied to analyze the maneuverability of the platform. It is hoped that this work is useful to support the evaluation of maneuverability and the development of control system for the near-space earth observation platform.

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“…As a typical lighter-than-air vehicle, the robotic airships provide promising and unique airborne platforms for various applications, such as surveillance, 1,2 earth observation, 3 region navigation 4 and telecommunication and environmental monitoring. 5,6 These applications require a capability of high-precision track-keeping along a commanded trajectory.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neural network gain-scheduling sliding mode control for three-dimensional trajectory tracking of robotic airships

Yang

Yan

2015

Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, Part I:

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This article proposed a novel control approach for trajectory tracking of robotic airships. First, the nonlinear dynamics model of a robotic airship is derived and formulated. Second, a sliding mode controller is designed to track the commanded trajectory for its robustness against parametric variations and external disturbances. To address the chattering problem results from the sliding mode controller, a radial basis function neural network is adopted to construct the neural network self-gain-scheduling sliding mode controller in which the control gains are scheduled synchronously with the sliding surface via radial basis function neural network according to the learning algorithm, with switching sliding surface and its differential as radial basis function neural network inputs and control gains as radial basis function neural network outputs. In addition, the stability and convergence of the closed-loop controller are proven using the Lyapunov stability theorem. Finally, the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed controller are demonstrated via numerical simulations. Contrasting simulation results indicate that the neural network self-gain-scheduling sliding mode controller attenuates the chattering effectively and has better performance against the sliding mode controller.

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A Novel Concept for Stratospheric Communications and Surveillance: The StarLight

Cited by 30 publications

References 7 publications

Trajectory Tracking Control for a Stratospheric Airship Subject to Constraints and Unknown Disturbances

Trajectory Tracking Control for a Stratospheric Airship Subject to Constraints and Unknown Disturbances

Dynamics modeing and maneuverability analysis of a near-space earth observation platform

Neural network gain-scheduling sliding mode control for three-dimensional trajectory tracking of robotic airships

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