Faster, Higher, and Greener: Vehicular Optimal Control

Vehicular optimal control problems have been studied extensively since the early part of the 20th century. Progress in solving these problems has been driven primarily by applications in space and atmospheric flight, including launch vehicles, Earth-based and interplanetary space orbital transfer, and high-performance supersonic aircraft. In all of these applications, the ability to solve increasingly complex optimal control problems has been made possible by advances in high-speed computing. The mathematical and computing techniques being developed are now so diverse, and the range of applications of optimal control so broad, that a comprehensive review of the entire scope of vehicular optimal control is an impossible task. Instead, we will attempt only to provide a flavor of the scope and variety of these problems.