Research on collaborative multi-UAV localization method based on combination navigation information

In challenging environments, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) systems often encounter unstable satellite signals and communication link interference. This paper proposes an integrated navigation method that integrates inertial navigation system (INS), global navigation satellite system (GNSS), and visual navigation system (VNS). Utilizing data from onboard sensors, this method merges relative navigation information from feature tracking of multiple UAVs with each UAV’s absolute navigation data. It includes specially designed transmission rules to reduce data exchange between UAVs. Each UAV uses an adaptive unscented Kalman filter (AUKF) method, which is enhanced into a collaborative AUKF (C-AUKF) using a message passing-based approach. Experiments in a simulated mission scenario revealed that the C-AUKF, in comparison to using extended Kalman filter (EKF), significantly improved flight test performance across the entire testing area, with a cumulative deviation of only 10.22 m, about 0.85% of the total flight distance. These results demonstrate that the proposed method not only meets accuracy requirements for position and velocity in integrated navigation but also significantly enhances multi-UAV navigation precision, particularly in scenarios with global positioning system (GPS) interference.