Robust Attitude Control of Nonlinear Multi-Rotor Dynamics with LFT Models and $mathcal{H}_infty$ Performance

2025-09-30

AI Summary

To address attitude stabilization of multirotor UAVs under uncertain environmental disturbances—such as wind gusts and gyroscope noise—this paper proposes a gyroscope-only LPV-based ℋ∞ robust control method. The nonlinear dynamics are reformulated as a parameter-dependent Linear Fractional Transformation (LFT), explicitly capturing structured uncertainties including wind disturbances and inertia variations. Based on this LPV-LFT model, an ℋ∞ controller is synthesized without requiring full-state feedback, thereby significantly reducing sensor dependency and implementation complexity. Simulation results demonstrate that, under strong wind disturbances, the proposed method reduces attitude regulation error by 62% compared to classical PID control, exhibits superior noise rejection, and achieves enhanced robust stability. These findings validate its practical applicability under resource-constrained sensing conditions.

Technology Category

• Intelligent Robots: State Estimation
• Planning, Routing, and Scheduling: Planning under Uncertainty
• Reasoning under Uncertainty: Stochastic Optimization

Application Category

• Graph Algorithms and Modeling for the Web: Efficient manipulation of static and dynamic Web-related graphs
• Responsible Web: Machine-in-the-loop, human agency and autonomy
• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: Attacks and countermeasures in recommendation systems

Abstract

Attitude stabilization of unmanned aerial vehicles in uncertain environments presents significant challenges due to nonlinear dynamics, parameter variations, and sensor limitations. This paper presents a comparative study of $mathcal{H}_infty$ and classical PID controllers for multi-rotor attitude regulation in the presence of wind disturbances and gyroscope noise. The flight dynamics are modeled using a linear parameter-varying (LPV) framework, where nonlinearities and parameter variations are systematically represented as structured uncertainties within a linear fractional transformation formulation. A robust controller based on $mathcal{H}_infty$ formulation is designed using only gyroscope measurements to ensure guaranteed performance bounds. Nonlinear simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the robust controllers compared to classical PID control, showing significant improvement in attitude regulation under severe wind disturbances.

Problem

• Robust attitude control for multi-rotor UAVs with nonlinear dynamics
• Addressing wind disturbances and gyroscope noise in uncertain environments
• Comparing H-infinity and PID controllers for attitude stabilization performance

Innovation

• Uses H-infinity robust control for attitude regulation
• Models nonlinear dynamics with LFT uncertainty framework
• Employs only gyroscope measurements for control