A simple adaptive PD controller for multiple autonomous underwater vehicles

This paper presents an adaptive PD control scheme for multiple autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs). The proposed adaptive PD controller with uncertain gravitational and buoyancy forces requires only model of gravity and buoyancy regressor matrix and does not need any knowledge of inertia matrix, Coriolis and centripetal force, hydrodynamic damping and the parameters of the gravity and buoyancy forces of the AUVs. Hence, the proposed controller has the advantages of simplicity and ease of implementation. Collision and obstacles avoidance strategy using multi-layer region control is also discussed. Stability analysis of the system is presented with the aid of Lyapunov-like function. Simulation studies on AUVs with 6 degrees of freedom are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed controller.