Robust hovering and trajectory tracking control of a quadrotor helicopter using acceleration feedback and a novel disturbance observer

Hovering and trajectory tracking control of rotary-wing aircrafts in the presence of uncertainties and external disturbances is a very challenging task. This thesis focuses on the development of the robust hovering and trajectory tracking control algorithms for a quadrotor helicopter subject to both periodic and aperiodic disturbances along with noise and parametric uncertainties. A hierarchical control structure is employed where high-level position controllers produce reference attitude angles for the low-level attitude controllers. Reference attitude angles are usually determined analytically from the position command signals that control the positional dynamics. However, such analytical formulas may produce large and non-smooth reference angles which must be saturated and low-pass filtered. In this thesis, desired attitude angles are determined numerically using constrained nonlinear optimization where certain magnitude and rate constraints are imposed. Furthermore, an acceleration based disturbance observer (AbDOB) is designed to estimate and suppress disturbances acting on the positional dynamics of the quadrotor. For the attitude control, a nested position, velocity, and inner acceleration feedback control structure consisting of PID and PI type controllers are developed to provide high sti ness against external disturbances. Reliable angular acceleration is estimated through an extended Kalman filter (EKF) cascaded with a classical Kalman lter (KF). This thesis also proposes a novel disturbance observer which consists of a bank of band-pass filters connected parallel to the low-pass filter of a classical disturbance observer. Band-pass filters are centered at integer multiples of the fundamental frequency of the periodic disturbance. Number and bandwidth of the band-pass filters are two crucial parameters to be tuned in the implementation of the new structure. Proposed disturbance observer is integrated with a sliding mode controller to tackle the robust hovering and trajectory tracking control problem. The sensitivity of the proposed disturbance observer based control system to the number and bandwidth of the band-pass filters are thoroughly investigated via several simulations. Simulations are carried out on a high delity model where sensor biases and measurement noise are also considered. Results show that the proposed controllers are very effective in providing robust hovering and trajectory tracking performance when the quadrotor helicopter is subject to the wind gusts generated by the Dryden wind model along with plant uncertainties and measurement noise. A comparison with the classical disturbance observer-based control is also provided where better tracking performance with improved robustness is achieved in the presence of noise and external disturbance

Control of a hovering quadrotor UAV subject to periodic disturbances

Quadrotor is a rotary-wing UAV, which has a simple structure but highly nonlinear dynamics. Controlling a hovering quadrotor subject to external disturbances is a crucial task in many applications. In this paper, periodic disturbances have been tackled and novel disturbance observers (DOB) have been developed to estimate the total disturbance acting on the vehicle. It is especially difficult to reject periodic disturbances in low as well as in high frequency region due to the bandwidth limitations of the low-pass filter utilized in conventional DOB. As the cutoff frequency of the low-pass filter is critical, increased bandwidth reduces the robustness which degrades the disturbance rejection performance in the presence of noise. In addition to the low-pass filter, the new structure also consists of a bank of band-pass filters and a high-pass filter. Since the total disturbance acting on the vehicle is compensated by the proposed DOB, PD controllers with feedforward terms are utilized for stabilizing both position and attitude dynamics. Simulation results show the improved robustness obtained by the proposed method

Control of a hovering quadrotor UAV subject to periodic disturbances

Quadrotor is a rotary-wing UAV, which has a simple structure but highly nonlinear dynamics. Controlling a hovering quadrotor subject to external disturbances is a crucial task in many applications. In this paper, periodic disturbances have been tackled and novel disturbance observers (DOB) have been developed to estimate the total disturbance acting on the vehicle. It is especially difficult to reject periodic disturbances in low as well as in high frequency region due to the bandwidth limitations of the low-pass filter utilized in conventional DOB. As the cutoff frequency of the low-pass filter is critical, increased bandwidth reduces the robustness which degrades the disturbance rejection performance in the presence of noise. In addition to the low-pass filter, the new structure also consists of a bank of band-pass filters and a high-pass filter. Since the total disturbance acting on the vehicle is compensated by the proposed DOB, PD controllers with feedforward terms are utilized for stabilizing both position and attitude dynamics. Simulation results show the improved robustness obtained by the proposed method

Nonlinear adaptive control of an aerial manipulation system

This paper presents the nonlinear adaptive control of a quadrotor endowed with a 2 degrees of freedom (DOF) manipulator. By considering the quadrotor and the robot arm as a combined system, complete modeling of the aerial manipulation system (AMS) has been presented using the Euler-Lagrange method. A hierarchical nonlinear control scheme which consists of outer and inner control loops has been utilized. Model Reference Adaptive Controller (MRAC) is designed for the outer loop where the required command signals are generated to force the quadrotor to move on a reference trajectory in the presence of uncertainties and reaction forces coming from the manipulator. For the inner loop, the attitude dynamics of the quadrotor and the dynamics of the 2-DOF robotic arm are considered as a fully actuated 5-DOF unified part of the AMS. Nonlinear adaptive control has been utilized for the low-level controller where the changes in inertias and the masses have been tackled along with the reaction forces acting on the attitude part of the AMS. The proposed technique has been validated through simulations in two different scenarios

Trajectory control of a quadrotor using a control allocation approach

A quadrotor is an underactuated unmanned aerial vehicle with four inputs to control the dynamics. Trajectory control of a quadrotor is a challenging task and usually tackled in a hierarchical framework where desired/reference attitude angles are analytically determined from the desired command signals, i.e. virtual controls, that control the positional dynamics of the quadrotor and the desired yaw angle is set to some constant value. Although this method is relatively straightforward, it may produce large and nonsmooth reference angles which must be saturated and low-pass filtered. In this work, we show that the determination of desired attitude angles from virtual controls can be viewed as a control allocation problem and it can be solved numerically using nonlinear optimization where certain magnitude and rate constraints can be imposed on the desired attitude angles and the yaw angle need not be constant. Simulation results for both analytical and numerical methods have been presented and compared. Results for constrained optimization show that the flight performance is quite satisfactory

Evaluation of Corroded OPS Fiber-Concrete using NDT Method

Concrete is one part of an infrastructure that is very commonly used, materials widely used in making concrete, such as sand and gravel, come from nature that are limited and will run out if used continuously. Oil palm shell (OPS) waste is an  alternative that can be used to solve this problem. In this study the proportion of OPS used was 0%, 25%, 50%, and 75% as a partial substitute for coarse aggregate. Pre- and post-corrosion specimens use beam sizes with dimensions of 10 cm × 10 cm × 50 cm. The specimen has a corrosion rate of 7%. The specimen is tested for flexural strength, in addition, the specimen is tested using the Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) method at the age of 28 days and after acceleration corrosion. The NDT method is one way for early inspection to determine the condition of a concrete structure. The NDT methods used in this study were resistivity and impact-echo as evaluation tools for the influence of OPS and fiber on corroded concrete. Based on the results that have been carried out, the lowest resistivity value was 10.87 kohm/cm on 0% OPS post-corrosion specimen and the highest resistivity value of 24.12 kohm/cm on 0% OPS pre-corrosion specimen. Meanwhile, the impact-echo test obtained the lowest value of 2625.33 kHz on 75% OPS post-corrosion specimen and the highest impact-echo value of 11725.26 kHz on 0% OPS post-corrosion specimens. With the increase in the percentage of OPS, the resistivity obtained in pre-corrosion concrete will decrease as well as the impact echo value, except for the 75% OPS specimen, while in post-corrosion specimen impact-echo and resistivity are inversely proportional. The greater the percentage of OPS in concrete, the resistivity value tends to increase but the frequency of impact-echo tends to decrease except specimen with 75% OPS

Design and implementation of Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference system for the control of an uncertain Ball on Beam Apparatus

Controlling an uncertain mechatronic system is challenging and crucial for its automation. In this regard, several control-strategies are developed to handle such systems. However, these control-strategies are complex to design, and require in-depth knowledge of the system and its dynamics. In this study, we are testing the performance of a rather simple control-strategy (Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System) using an uncertain Ball and Beam System. The custom-designed apparatus utilizes image processing technique to acquire the position of the ball on the beam. Then, desired position is achieved by controlling the beam angle using Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy and PID control. We are showing that adaptive neuro-fuzzy control can effectively handle the system uncertainties, which traditional controllers (i.e., PID) cannot handle

Antimicrobial resistance among migrants in Europe: a systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: Rates of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) are rising globally and there is concern that increased migration is contributing to the burden of antibiotic resistance in Europe. However, the effect of migration on the burden of AMR in Europe has not yet been comprehensively examined. Therefore, we did a systematic review and meta-analysis to identify and synthesise data for AMR carriage or infection in migrants to Europe to examine differences in patterns of AMR across migrant groups and in different settings. METHODS: For this systematic review and meta-analysis, we searched MEDLINE, Embase, PubMed, and Scopus with no language restrictions from Jan 1, 2000, to Jan 18, 2017, for primary data from observational studies reporting antibacterial resistance in common bacterial pathogens among migrants to 21 European Union-15 and European Economic Area countries. To be eligible for inclusion, studies had to report data on carriage or infection with laboratory-confirmed antibiotic-resistant organisms in migrant populations. We extracted data from eligible studies and assessed quality using piloted, standardised forms. We did not examine drug resistance in tuberculosis and excluded articles solely reporting on this parameter. We also excluded articles in which migrant status was determined by ethnicity, country of birth of participants' parents, or was not defined, and articles in which data were not disaggregated by migrant status. Outcomes were carriage of or infection with antibiotic-resistant organisms. We used random-effects models to calculate the pooled prevalence of each outcome. The study protocol is registered with PROSPERO, number CRD42016043681. FINDINGS: We identified 2274 articles, of which 23 observational studies reporting on antibiotic resistance in 2319 migrants were included. The pooled prevalence of any AMR carriage or AMR infection in migrants was 25·4% (95% CI 19·1-31·8; I2 =98%), including meticillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (7·8%, 4·8-10·7; I2 =92%) and antibiotic-resistant Gram-negative bacteria (27·2%, 17·6-36·8; I2 =94%). The pooled prevalence of any AMR carriage or infection was higher in refugees and asylum seekers (33·0%, 18·3-47·6; I2 =98%) than in other migrant groups (6·6%, 1·8-11·3; I2 =92%). The pooled prevalence of antibiotic-resistant organisms was slightly higher in high-migrant community settings (33·1%, 11·1-55·1; I2 =96%) than in migrants in hospitals (24·3%, 16·1-32·6; I2 =98%). We did not find evidence of high rates of transmission of AMR from migrant to host populations. INTERPRETATION: Migrants are exposed to conditions favouring the emergence of drug resistance during transit and in host countries in Europe. Increased antibiotic resistance among refugees and asylum seekers and in high-migrant community settings (such as refugee camps and detention facilities) highlights the need for improved living conditions, access to health care, and initiatives to facilitate detection of and appropriate high-quality treatment for antibiotic-resistant infections during transit and in host countries. Protocols for the prevention and control of infection and for antibiotic surveillance need to be integrated in all aspects of health care, which should be accessible for all migrant groups, and should target determinants of AMR before, during, and after migration. FUNDING: UK National Institute for Health Research Imperial Biomedical Research Centre, Imperial College Healthcare Charity, the Wellcome Trust, and UK National Institute for Health Research Health Protection Research Unit in Healthcare-associated Infections and Antimictobial Resistance at Imperial College London