A Multi-Layer Autonomous Intelligent Control Architecture for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Jovan D. Boskovic, Ravi Prasanth, Raman K. Mehra
2004 Journal of Aerospace Computing Information and Communication  
In the past several years there has been a lot of interest in the design of efficient autonomous intelligent controllers for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV). This is a highly complex and challenging problem since future UAVs will be expected to complete autonomously a wide variety of complex missions, and achieve performance comparable to that of manned vehicles. In this paper a four-layer autonomous intelligent control architecture for UAVs is described, and related issues are discussed. The
more » ... hitecture consists of the following layers: (i) Redundancy Management Layer that consists of the online Failure Detection and Identification (FDI) and robust feedback Adaptive Reconfigurable Controller (ARC); (ii) Autonomous Trajectory Generation (ATG) layer whose role is to fit feasible trajectories through the desired way-points in real time; (iii) Autonomous Path Planning (APP) layer that generates way-points on-line in response to a dynamically changing environment; and (iv) Autonomous Decision Making (ADM) layer whose role is to assess the available control authority after failures, and make missionrelated decisions in near-real time. The main distinguishing feature of the architecture is that its layers are connected through the Achievable Dynamic Performance (ADP) calculation module which results in a system in which all the decisions are made based on the current available resources. Recent extensions of this architecture are also discussed and described in detail. At the end, a discussion is included on the Verification and Validation (V&V) of intelligent and adaptive control systems, and some recent results are presented.
doi:10.2514/1.12823 fatcat:peiahabca5ccvhzivswvurftlm