Formation Acquisition of Multi Robotic Vehicles with Unscented Kalman Filter Based Noise Filtering

In this paper, a backstepping controller with state estimator is proposed to achieve formation acquisition of multi robotic vehicles. On achieving formation acquisition, the multi robotic vehicles are expected to attain a predefined geometrical shape. Rigid graph approach with backstepping technique is exploited to design a formation controller. A state estimator is then developed through unscented Kalman filter (UKF) algorithm to filter out noises (process noise, measurement noise) in the system. The output of the estimator is given to the controller thereby making the controlled system robust to noises. The stability of controlled system is analysed using Lyapunov theory. Simulation results validate the effectiveness of the proposed controller and state estimator in exhibiting superior performance in the presence of process and measurement noise.