Nonlinear Decentralized Model Predictive Control Strategy for a Formation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Aerial vehicles flying in formation may perform more complex tasks than vehicles flying independently. Formation control, however, is a difficult problem to cope with for these kind of vehicles, since they are highly nonlinear, underactuated and the feasible control actions are constrained. Moreover the computational capabilities which can be mounted on aerial vehicles are usually limited, thus centralized solutions should be avoided. To solve these problems, a Nonlinear Decentralized Model Predictive Control algorithm is presented in this paper, taking into account both physical and actuation constraints. Each vehicle is equipped with sensors providing inertial measurements and communicates with its neighbours using a Wireless Local Area Network. Simulation results applied to a formation of quadrotor vehicles show that the proposed technique is a valid way to solve the control problem for a generic formation, granting at the same time the possibility to deal with constraints.