Distributed active disturbance rejection formation containment control for multiple autonomous underwater vehicles with prescribed performance

Abstract

In this paper, a distributed formation containment control (FCC) issue is studied for multiple autonomous underwater vehicles (MAUVs) system with prescribed performance based on the active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) method in three-dimensional space. The unknown nonlinearities and external disturbances of the MAUVs system are approximated in real time by means of extended state observers (ESOs). Furthermore, tracking differentiators (TDs) are introduced for the sake of refraining from the explosion of complexity induced by the derivatives of the virtual control variables of autonomous underwater vehicles. Applying funnel variables, our designed control strategy ensures the formation tracking errors and containment errors to keep within the specified ranges, hence enhancing the control performance of the MAUVs system. Then, a FCC-ADRC scheme for MAUVs system is proposed. Compared with the traditional FCC scheme, the proposed FCC-ADRC scheme not only does not depend on the specific system configuration, but also can deal with any bounded disturbances, thus obtaining a more general, effective and robust disturbance rejection FCC strategies. Additionally, the stability of MAUVs system is verified through Lyapunov stability analysis. At last, the error curves and time-varying formation containment trajectories obtained by simulation confirm the feasibility and effectiveness of our method.