3D path following and L1 adaptive control for underwater vehicles

This paper addresses the problem of guidance and control of underwater vehicles. A multi-level control strategy is used to determine (1) outer-loop path-following commands and (2) inner-loop actuation commands. Specifically, a line-of-sight path-following algorithm is used to guide the vehicle along a three-dimensional path, and an L-1 adaptive control algorithm is used to determine the low-level rudder commands to accomplish path following. The performance bounds of these outer-and inner-loop control algorithms are presented. Numerical results obtained using a physics-based Simulink model are used to aid in visualization of the control algorithm's performance.