Autonomous Obstacle Avoidance Control for Multi-UUVs Based on Multi-beam Sonars

In this paper, a new method applied improved artificial potential method to solve the coordinate control problem of autonomous obstacle avoidance control for the formation of multi-UUVs is investigated. First, considering about the space waste problem of traditional artificial potential field method, we proposed the new potential field space which was based on the smallest contour circular area. Secondly, the reference obstacle point used for building the virtual potential field was setting as moving at the edge of the smallest contour circular area, and used the relation of distance and sailing angle between UUV and the obstacle to get an optimized potential field function, then an optimized motion space gained. Then we obtained a new coordinate obstacle avoidance control method for multiple UUV formation based on the gradient of the potential field function and the coordinate control input. Finally, the simulation result illustrate the system is convergent and stable.