Adaptive backstepping control approach for the trajectory tracking of mobile manipulators

Abstract

This paper presents a novel adaptive backstepping controller for n + m degrees of freedom (DOF) mobile manipulator with the aim of simultaneous control of the velocity of the mobile platform and the motion of the end-effector. Using the idea of kinematic backstepping control and adaptive torque control, a two-step controller is presented for the nonholonomic mobile manipulator. A kinematic velocity control is designed in the first step such that all the desired trajectories are achieved. In the second step, the adaptive torque controller based on the dynamics of the mobile manipulator is designed such that the mobile platform velocity and the end-effector position converge to the reference trajectories designed in the first step. This control scheme provides an efficient solution to the motion control problem of mobile manipulators and the simulation results verify the effectiveness of the proposed control design.