Observer-based robust platoon formation control of electrically driven car-like mobile robots under collision avoidance and connectivity maintenance with a prescribed performance

This study intends to address the platoon formation control problem of a team of N electrically driven underactuated autonomous car-like mobile robots. A platoon controller is proposed by using the relative distance and angle between each two successive robots in the platoon. A high-gain observer is also used to leave out velocity sensors to reduce the cost of the implementation/maintenance and the weight of the robots. Then, the dynamic surface control method is used to prevent complexity of the controller design. Next, by utilizing the prescribed performance bound method, predetermined desired transient and steady-state behavior of the tracking formation errors, robots connectivity preservation, and their collision avoidance are guaranteed as well as singularity avoidance. Adaptive neural networks and adaptive robust controllers are used to improve the tracking performance in the presence of parametric and nonparametric uncertainties, unmodeled dynamics, actuator saturation nonlinearity, and unwanted external disturbances including exogenous forces and torques, friction, and vibration. The Lyapunov direct method proves that all signals of the closed-loop control system are uniformly ultimately bounded. Finally, simulation results are demonstrated to show the superiority of the proposed convoy tracking system.