Fully distributed time-varying formation tracking control for multiple quadrotor vehicles via finite-time convergent extended state observer

This paper investigates a time-varying anti-disturbance formation problem for a group of quadrotor aircrafts with time-varying uncertainties and a directed interaction topology. A novel Finite-Time Convergent Extended State Observer (FTCESO) based fully-distributed formation control scheme is proposed to enhance the disturbance rejection and the formation tracking performances for networked quadrotors. By adopting the hierarchical control strategy, the multi-quadrotor system is separated into two subsystems: the outer-loop cooperative subsystem and the inner-loop attitude subsystem. In the outer-loop subsystem, with the estimation of disturbing forces and uncertain dynamics from FTCESOs, an adaptive consensus theory based cooperative controller is exploited to ensure the multiple quadrotors form and maintain a time-varying pattern relying only on the positions of the neighboring aircrafts. In the inner-loop subsystem, the desired attitude generated by the cooperative control law is stably tracked under a FTCESO-based attitude controller in a finite time. Based on a detailed algorithm to specify the cooperative control protocol, the feasibility condition to achieve the time-varying anti-disturbance formation tracking is derived and the rigorous analysis of the whole closed-loop multi-quadrotor system is given. Some numerical examples are conducted to intuitively demonstrate the effectiveness and the improvements of the proposed control framework.     

A survey of safety separation management and collision avoidance approaches of civil UAS operating in integration national airspace system

Recent years have witnessed a booming of the industry of civil Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS). As an emerging industry, the UAS industry has been attracting great attention from governments of all countries and the aviation industry. UAS are highly digitalized, informationized, and intelligent; therefore, their integration into the national airspace system has become an important trend in the development of civil aviation. However, the complexity of UAS operation poses great challenges to the traditional aviation regulatory system and technical means. How to prevent collisions between UASs and between UAS and manned aircraft to achieve safe and efficient operation in the integrated operating airspace has become a common challenge for industry and academia around the world. In recent years, the international community has carried out a great amount of work and experiments in the air traffic management of UAS and some of the key technologies. This paper attempts to make a review of the UAS separation management and key technologies in collision avoidance in the integrated airspace, mainly focusing on the current situation of UAS Traffic Management (UTM), safety separation standards, detection system, collision risk prediction, collision avoidance, safety risk assessment, etc., as well as an analysis of the bottlenecks that the current researches encountered and their development trends, so as to provide some insights and references for further research in this regard. Finally, this paper makes a further summary of some of the research highlights and challenges.     

Fault mode probability factor based fault-tolerant control for dissimilar redundant actuation system

This paper presents a Fault Mode Probability Factor (FMPF) based Fault-Tolerant Control (FTC) strategy for multiple faults of Dissimilar Redundant Actuation System (DRAS) composed of Hydraulic Actuator (HA) and Electro-Hydrostatic Actuator (EHA). The long-term service and severe working conditions can result in multiple gradual faults which can ultimately degrade the system performance, resulting in the system model drift into the fault state characterized with parameter uncertainty. The paper proposes to address this problem by using the historical statistics of the multiple gradual faults and the proposed FMPF to amend the system model with parameter uncertainty. To balance the system model precision and computation time, a Moving Window (MW) method is used to determine the applied historical statistics. The FMPF based FTC strategy is developed for the amended system model where the system estimation and Linear Quadratic Regulator (LQR) are updated at the end of system sampling period. The simulations of DRAS system subjected to multiple faults have been performed and the results indicate the effectiveness of the proposed approach.     

Effect of moderate geomagnetic storms on equatorial plasma bubbles over eastern Africa in the year 2012: Evolution and electrodynamics

Equatorial plasma bubbles (EPBs) are common features of the equatorial and low-latitude ionosphere and are known to cause radio wave scintillation which leads to the degradation of communication and navigation systems. Although these structures have been studied for decades, a full understanding of their evolution and dynamics remains important for space weather mitigation purposes. In this study, we present cases of EPBs occurrences around April and July 2012 geomagnetic storm periods over the African equatorial sector. The EPBs were observed from the Communications/Navigation Outage Forecasting System (C/NOFS) and generally correlated well to the ionospheric irregularities observed from the Global Positioning System total electron content (GPS-TEC) measurements (rate of TEC change, ROT). This study revealed that the evolution of the EPBs during moderate storms is controlled by the strength of the daytime equatorial electrojet (EEJ) currents regardless of the strength of the equatorial ionization anomaly (EIA), the latter is observed during the July storm case in particular. These effects were more evident during the main and part of the early recovery phases of the geomagnetic storm days considered. However, the evening hours TEC gradients between regions of the magnetic equator and ionization crests also played roles in the existence of ionospheric irregularities.     

Unsteady wakes-secondary flow interactions in a high-lift low-pressure turbine cascade

Detailed experimental measurements were conducted to study the interactions between incoming wakes and endwall secondary flow in a high-lift Low-Pressure Turbine (LPT) cascade. All of the measurements were conducted in both the presence and absence of incoming wakes, and numerical analysis was performed to elucidate the flow mechanism. With increasing Reynolds number, the influence of the incoming wakes on suppressing the secondary flow gradually increased owing to the greater influence of incoming wakes on reducing the negative incidence angle at higher Reynolds numbers, leading to a lower blade loading near the leading edge and suppression of the Pressure Side (PS) leg of the horseshoe vortex. However, the effect of unsteady wakes on suppressing the profile losses gradually became weaker owing to the reduced size of the Suction Side (SS) separation bubble and increased mixing loss in the free-flow region at high Reynolds numbers. Incoming wakes clearly improved the aerodynamic performance of the low-pressure turbine cascade at low Reynolds numbers of 25,000 and 50,000. In contrast, at the high Reynolds number of 100,000, the profile loss at the midspan and mass-averaged total losses downstream of the cascade were higher in the presence of wakes than in the absence of wakes, and the unsteady wakes exerted a negative influence on the aerodynamic performance of the LPT cascade.     

流动阻力及能量损失对注射成型制件的影响

本文分析了在塑料熔体充满型腔的过程中，流动阻力及能量损失产生的形式和物理原因，进而讨论了对塑料制件成型及凝固过程中的影响。并提出降低影响的措施。     

预测悬停旋翼跨音速流动的一种组合自由尾流/CFD方法

一种新的组合自由尾流 / CFD方法用于悬停旋翼流动的 CFD解中以考虑实际尾流的作用 .用文中描述的尾流分析方法研究了螺旋尖涡的运动 .首先从广义尾流模型开始 ,用半经验公式模化了涡核对旋翼尾流的作用 ;然后在环量收敛和尾迹收敛的条件下完成了自由尾迹计算 ;最后应用 Jameson有限体积龙格 -库塔推进格式求解了欧拉方程 .所得结果与相关文献和实验数据进行了比较     

ADI方法求解完全跨声速非定常小扰动方程

本文修改了Whitlow的ADI格式,以便求解另一变形的完全跨声速小扰动方程。本文给出的NACA64A006和NACA0012翼型的非定常跨声速流动的计算结果与其它数值结果和实验结果的比较表明本文格式是合理的且便于实际应用的。     

RPC-MAG The Fluxgate Magnetometer in the ROSETTA Plasma Consortium

The fluxgate magnetometer experiment onboard the ROSETTA spacecraft aims to measure the magnetic field in the interaction region of the solar wind plasma with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It consists of a system of two ultra light (about 28 g each ) triaxial fluxgate magnetometer sensors, mounted on the 1.5 m long spacecraft boom. The measurement range of each sensor is ±16384 nT with quantization steps of 31 pT. The magnetometer sensors are operated with a time resolution of up to 0.05 s, corresponding to a bandwidth of 0–10 Hz. This performance of the RPC-MAG sensors allows detailed analyses of magnetic field variations in the cometary environment. RPC-MAG furthermore is designed to study possible remnant magnetic fields of the nucleus, measurements which will be done in close cooperation with the ROSETTA lander magnetometer experiment ROMAP.     

最坏风模型及对飞机突防航迹跟踪的影响

针对一类非线性动力学系统,本文推导出二次型性能指标下的微分对策解,由此得到一组含有非线性因素的最环风模型,这一模型特别适用于研究作空间机动飞行的飞机受外界环境扰动的灵敏性问题。最后考察了这一变化风场对飞机突防航迹非线性解耦跟踪的影响。