CAREER: Internal Shape Control for Ocean and Atmospheric Vehicles

该提案描述了一种研究和教育的共生关系，它以一种推进非线性控制理论的状态和适用性的方式融合了力学和控制，同时提供了独特的机会，通过吸引他们最早的魅力来教育工程师。 该研究将最近开发的用于控制机械系统的能量方法与粘性流体力的经验模型相结合，以便使用内部致动器控制海洋和大气车辆。 教育活动补充了这项研究，并通过涉及车辆动力学和控制以及创意设计的现实工程挑战，培养学生和未来学生对学习和发现的兴奋。 该研究采用能量成形控制策略来稳定和操纵使用内部转子或移动质量的车辆，重点是水下航行器的“案例研究”。 通过将粘性效应纳入控制设计过程，可以通过巧妙地调节飞行器的内部形状来利用它们。 研究目标包括表征非保守力对使用能量成形反馈控制的系统的影响，开发利用粘性效应的内部驱动车辆的控制策略，将这些策略扩展到具有传统致动器的车辆，并评估控制器的性能与实验水下航行器。 内部执行器有望显着提高水下航行器的效率，可靠性和性能范围，使其更接近海洋科学，海上工业和军事的主力军。 由此产生的理论可以应用的其他领域包括内部或传统驱动的海洋表面船只，轻于空气的车辆，飞机，低轨道或重返航天器，以及更一般的机械系统。

This proposal describes a symbiosis of research and education which blends mechanics and control in a way that advances the state and applicability of nonlinear control theory while offering unique opportunities to educate engineers by appealing to their earliest fascinations. The research integrates recently developed energy methods for controlling mechanical systems with empirical models of viscous fluid forces in order to control ocean and atmospheric vehicles using internal actuators. Educational activities complement this research and cultivate excitement for learning and discovery among students, and prospective students, through real-world engineering challenges involving vehicle dynamics and control and creative design. The research adapts energy-shaping control strategies to stabilize and maneuver vehicles using internal rotors or moving masses, focusing on the "case study" of an underwater vehicle. By incorporating viscous effects into the control design process, one may use them to advantage through clever modulation of a vehicle's internal shape. Research objectives include characterizing the effect of non-conservative forces on systems controlled using energy-shaping feedback, developing control strategies for internally actuated vehicles which exploit viscous effects, extending these strategies to vehicles with conventional actuators, and evaluating controller performance with an experimental underwater vehicle. Internal actuators promise to significantly enhance the efficiency, reliability, and performance envelope of underwater vehicles, moving them closer toward their inevitable role as workhorses for ocean science, offshore industry, and the military. Other areas where the resulting theory could be applied include internally or conventionally actuated ocean surface vessels, lighter-than-air vehicles, aircraft, low-orbit or re-entering spacecraft, and more general mechanical systems.