Inverse optimal control for autonomous carrier landing with disturbances

Abstract

This work addresses the optimal control of carrier landing affected by deck motion and airwake disturbances. Starting from aircraft dynamics written under an affine form, a novel inverse optimal control approach is designed and then used as the main control technique to provide fast and accurate tracking of the aircraft reference trajectory, as well as to improve the convergence performances and the success rate of the automatic carrier landing. A robust automatic control landing system is proposed by designing a novel inverse optimal control algorithm based on disturbance observers (for the estimation and compensation of airwake), a deck motion compensation block, and fixed-time command filters for computing the reference signals and reducing the tracking errors. The proposed optimal scheme includes a guidance controller, an attitude controller (involving the control of the heading angle, attitude angles, and angular rates), and an approach power compensation system. The proposed architecture is proved to be globally stable by using the Lyapunov theory. Finally, the comparative simulation results prove both the reliability of the control scheme and the superiority of the novel inverse optimal control technique over other nonlinear control approaches employed in the design of automatic control landing systems.