The aerial manipulation of both rigid and deformable objects by Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) has gained significant traction in the field of aerial robotics in recent years. Despite the achievements in aerial manipulation, the control of position and shape for deformable object manipulation by UAVs is still an open challenge. There is a necessity for simple, reliable models that represent the behaviour of deformable objects with high fidelity and that can be used for control purposes.
This Academic Skills Project aims at producing a simple simulation of a pair of quadrotors that can collaboratively manipulate a flexible cable, representing a net or other litter collection device in the use-case that is being studied in particular. This simulation model will allow for rapid testing of novel high-level control algorithms such as force-based control.
Goals
- Produce a working simulation of two quadrotors co-manipulating a flexible cable suspended between them
- Explore different high-level control algorithms for the trajectory planning of the two quadrotors, particularly force-based control
Objectives
- Use the robotics simulator Gazebo to generate a simulated environment where the two quadrotors are interconnected via a flexible cable.
- Create a Gazebo model of the flexible cable using a series of rigid links interconnected by joints to approximately reproduce the cable's physical properties.
- Establish a communications architecture that allows the simulated quadrotor models in Gazebo to receive control signals from a MATLAB Simulink file.
- Using the Gazebo simulation and MATLAB Simulink, send high-level control signals to the quadrotors, generated by a novel control strategy, and have them successfully follow a simple trajectory.