Communication, Feedback and Decentralized Control for Platoons of Underwater Vehicles

摘要

Since communications bandwidth underwater is severely limited, platoons of underwater vehicles must cooperate with a minimum of direct communication. We present a control strategy for a platoon of underwater vehicles that requires broadcast-only communications from a single vehicle within the platoon. Even as the size of the platoon increases, the bandwidth of required communication remains constant. Our emphasis is on the mathematical developments necessary to prove existence of such a control system. In addition, we briefly describe a control system design procedure and present a simulation- based example.