Image-based control for dynamically cross-coupled aerial manipulation

Manipulation tasks carried out with aerial platforms composed of a UAV and a robotic arm involve cross-coupled dynamics between these subsystems. This paper proposes a new controller for this class of aerial robotic systems that allows regulating on velocity commands generated by an outer image-based visual-servo scheme. The controller, that considers the full dynamics of the system, is designed based on the integral backstepping approach. Visual feedback provided by an onboard camera is employed into a new visual servo scheme to simultaneously generate velocity commands for the UAV and the manipulator so that a visual target is reached. The control system takes into account the under-actuation related to rotary-wing vehicles, while at the same time it exploits the functionality system redundancy to achieve the task. Simulation results validate the proposed control system, as well as its robustness to large modeling error and measurement noise.