${{\mathcal L}_1}$ Adaptive Control of Vehicle Lateral Dynamics

In this paper, we present an application of L
₁
adaptive control for the vehicle lateral control problem. The main objective is to design a controller that ensures the vehicle follows the reference trajectory (center of the lane) with robustness to uncertain parameters of the vehicle lateral dynamics. The designed L
₁
adaptive control signal compensates the uncertainties and variations in model parameters in the presence of disturbances. A bicycle model for vehicle lateral dynamics is considered. We will demonstrate the desirable performance of the proposed adaptive controller at steady-state as well as the transient response. The simulation results confirm that the controller significantly improves the transient response of the vehicle lateral controller in the presence of wind gusts, road bank angle, icy or slippery road conditions, and other parameter uncertainties and unknown disturbances.