Consensus protocol based attitudes coordination control for Underwater Glider formation

This study focuses on the control problem when the Underwater Glider(UG) formation discovers a valuable tracking target and intends to change the formation motion. A linearized dynamic model of UG formation is established, and the model can be utilized in other formation research as a basic framework. Furthermore, a third-order consensus protocol is designed for attitude coordination. Each UG follower can coordinate their attitudes according to the information of the formation members based on the framework and consensus protocol. The simulation results illustrate that the proposed method has a better performance compared with previous work. The main results of this research provide a basis for the engineering application of a UG formation. • Attitudes coordination problem of an Underwater Glider formation is discussed. • Six situations with different communication structures are simulated. • The derivation of the linearization of UG’s dynamics model is provided. • The proof of the stability of the formation error system is provided.