Discrete-Time Net Capture Against an Intruder Using Multiple UAVs

This article investigates the problem of aerial capture using a net manipulated by multiple unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). To guarantee the interception of the intruder in practical sampling instants, a 3-D discrete-time proportional navigation-like guidance law is proposed for the geometric center of the net. Meanwhile, to capture the intruder within a considerably large interception area, a net-plane orienting strategy is formulated for each UAV. This strategy guarantees the determination of the desired positions for each UAV and designs a UAV controller considering disturbance compensation to drive the UAVs to track the desired positions, which ensures that the net plane becomes orthogonal to the guidance motion precisely at the instant of net intercepts the intruder. Finally, numerical simulations are conducted to illustrate the efficacy of the proposed approach.