Finite-Time Attitude Cooperative Control of Multiple Unmanned Aerial Vehicles via Fast Nonsingular Terminal Sliding Mode Control

Abstract

This paper discusses the attitude cooperative control of multiple unmanned aerial vehicle systems (MUAVs) with unknown dynamics and external disturbances. Distributed fast nonsingular terminal sliding mode control (FNTSMC) is used with quaternion-description dynamical systems. The dynamics and external disturbances are changed into lumped disturbances by formula transformation. A robust nonlinear disturbance observer is proposed to estimate the lumped disturbances in finite time. Then, combining the fast terminal sliding mode control, distributed FNTSMC controllers are designed under the directed topology. Based on the Lyapunov stability theory and graph theory, convergence stability of the nonlinear systems is strictly proved, and the tracking errors between the leader and the followers approach to a small residual set. Finally, the simulation example is presented to illustrate the effectiveness and advantage of the proposed controllers.