6 accepted papers
Moving path frames assigned to spatial curves are commonly used in the development of motion control laws for autonomous vehicles. This work presents the Gravity Normal frame, a novel navigation reference frame developed specifically for autonomous vehicle applications. This moving path frame incorp
Agile fixed-wing aircraft integrate the efficient, high-speed capabilities of conventional fixed-wing platforms with the extreme maneuverability of rotorcraft. This work presents a nonlinear control strategy that harnesses these capabilities to enable autonomous flight through aggressive, time-const…
This paper presents the modeling and control of a passively-coupled tilt-rotor vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. The aircraft consists of a quadrotor frame attached to a fixed-wing aircraft by an unactuated hinged mechanism. The platform is capable of smooth transitions from hover to forward fl…
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have become popular in a wide range of applications, including many military and civilian uses. State of the art control strategies for these vehicles are typically limited to a portion of the vehicle's flight envelope, and are tailored to a specific type of platform.…
Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are increasingly being proposed for a wide range of applications. A promising new class of these vehicles, known as agile fixed-wing UAV s, is intended to bridge the gap between conventional fixed-wing aircraft, which can cover long distances efficiently, and rotorcra…
A motion planner is developed for guiding a small aerobatic fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle to a desired goal region in a highly constrained, three-dimensional, known environment with static obstacles. The planner is based on the Rapidly-Exploring Random Trees (RRT) algorithm, and pieces together…