Decentralized cooperative trajectory planning for multiple UAVs in dynamic and uncertain environments

Abstract

This paper studies the problem of planning collision-free dynamically feasible trajectories for a team of autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in real-time, where the UAVs try to fly through a complex 3-D environment to reach their specified destinations. First, the cooperative trajectory planning problem is mathematically formulated as a decentralized receding horizon optimal control problem (DRH-OCP). Second, a decentralized coordination strategy for multi-vehicle real-time trajectory planning is designed by effectively combining the benefits of inverse dynamics optimization method and receding horizon optimal control technique. This coordination strategy mainly features that each vehicle only solves a sub-problem for its own plan and vehicles in the team make plans in parallel. Finally, simulation results show the feasibility of the proposed planning strategies.