Adaptive motion control of aerial robotic manipulators based on virtual decomposition

This paper deals with motion control of under-actuated aerial robotic manipulators composed of multi-rotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles and multi-link serial robotic arms. Kinematics and dynamics analysis of the multi-body mechanical system are performed. Using the method of virtual decomposition, adaptive motion control laws are proposed based on rigid-body inverse dynamics with feedback compensation. Underactuation imposes second-order nonholonomic constraints on the system dynamics, which are taken into account in the control algorithm. System stability and convergence of the tracking errors are proven using a Lyapunov analysis. A simulation case study demonstrates the effectiveness of the proposed model-based controller compared to a conventional controller.