Trajectory planning and following in urban environments: To reduce traffic accidents involving vulnerable road users

This thesis presents a comprehensive approach to integrating a trajectory planner and follower for autonomous vehicles (AVs) using model predictive contouring control (MPCC). The planner generates collision-free trajectories with a kinematic bicycle model, while the follower tracks them using a dynamic bicycle model with a smaller integration...

An Adaptive Neural Network Quadrotor Trajectory Tracking Controller Tolerant to Propeller Damage

Executing quadrotor trajectories accurately and therefore safely is a challenging task. State-of-the-art adaptive controllers achieve impressive trajectory tracking results with slight performance degradation in varying winds or payloads, but at the cost of computational...

Omnidirectional Monocular Collision Avoidance Onboard a Quadrotor

Reinforcement Learning from Simulation to Real World Autonomous Driving using Digital Twin

Autonomous driving is attracting growing attention because of the potential advantages it poses on safety, leisure, energy efficiency, reduced emissions, and traffic reduction. Current research is focusing on areas related to artificial intelligence to solve complex planning and decision-making tasks, object detection, or simultaneous...

Fuzzy Adaptive Output-Feedback Constrained Trajectory Tracking Control for HFVs with Fixed-Time Convergence

This article proposes an output-feedback fixed-time trajectory tracking control methodology for hypersonic flight vehicles subject to asymmetric output constraints. In contrast to the state of the art, the most distinguishing feature of our control design lies in avoiding using conventional recursive design methods (e.g., backstepping...

Trajectory control and dynamic modeling of a tailless flapping-wing robot

The DelFly Nimble is a type of tailless flapping-wing micro air vehicles (FWMAVs) that has received an increasing amount of attention. FWMAVs show efficient and agile flight possibilities at small scale. The aerodynamics and dynamics of these flapping vehicles are challenging and not fully understood. In this work, a strategy to implement a 3D...

Optimum On-board Abort Guidance based on Successive Convexification for Atmospheric Re-Entry Vehicles

Space safety and hazards reduction techniques are each day becoming more important in the design and operation of space transportation vehicles. One way to mitigate risks is to use advanced guidance strategies to centralise mission planning and guidance-navigation and control. Successive convexification is a technique suitable for this purpose...

The collaborative autonomous shipping experiment (Case): Motivations, theory, infrastructure, and experimental challenges

The future autonomous ships will be operating in an environment where different autonomous and non-autonomous vessels with different characteristics exist. These vessels are owned by different parties and each uses its owned unique approaches for guidance and navigation. The Collaborative Autonomous Shipping Experiment (CASE) aims at...

Optimal trajectory tracking control design: Emulating fighter aircraft flight test tracks with nonlinear model predictive control

Aircraft lifespan can be extended by upgrading and modernizing the electrical subsystems and instruments. However, this often introduces increased power demands and heat generation that the aircraft was not originally designed for and can result in a reduced flight performance and increased wear. Netherlands Aerospace Centre (NLR) and the...

Model-based Path Planning and Control for Autonomous Vehicles using Artificial Potential Fields

This report presents the results of the graduation thesis from the TU Delft, performed at the Integrated Vehicle Safety department of TNO. The goal of this graduation project is to develop a unified path planning and tracking method for autonomous vehicles in highway driving scenarios, by making use of Artificial Potential Fields (APFs).<br/><br...

Robust collision avoidance for multiple micro aerial vehicles using nonlinear model predictive control

When several Multirotor Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs) share the same airspace, reliable and robust collision avoidance is required. In this paper we address the problem of multi-MAV reactive collision avoidance. We employ a model-based controller to simultaneously track a reference trajectory and avoid collisions. Moreover, to achieve a higher...

Laser-Based Control of Rotary-Wing UAVs

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) present a high technological development rate nowadays. These vehicles can be used to perform dangerous and costly inspection procedures in structures with difficult access instead of human operators, but they still need a close monitoring. This thesis addresses the problem of using exclusively sensors on board...

Small-Scale Helicopter Automatic Autorotation: Modeling, Guidance, and Control

Our research objective consists in developing a, model-based, automatic safety recovery system, for a small-scale helicopter Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) in autorotation, i.e. an engine OFF flight condition, that safely flies and lands the helicopter to a pre-specified ground location. In pursuit of this objective, the contributions of this...