Collaborative Flight Transport System and Method Using Obstacle Avoidance Path Generation and Control

Collaborative Aerial Transport System Combining Offline Path Learning and Online Obstacle Avoidance

This technology is a collaborative aerial transport system and method for multi-aerial manipulators that combines server-based offline path planning with individual online obstacle avoidance algorithms. It generates paths using Bezier curves and RRT*, and produces smooth trajectories through least-squares interpolation.

Drones face weight limitations that make it difficult to equip them with precise force and torque sensors, preventing the use of conventional force-based control algorithms. Furthermore, existing collaborative transport methods have struggled with object recognition in complex environments and high computational loads during centralized control.

This technology utilizes constraint-chain-based equations of motion and adaptive sliding mode controllers without the need for force or torque sensors. It proposes a method that applies Bezier curves and shape-preserving piecewise cubic interpolation for offline path generation. Online, it detects unknown obstacles via vision sensors, allowing a virtual leader to generate corrected paths for safe collaborative transport. Applicable to the aerial transport of large cargo and construction materials, it provides an economical solution for achieving stable collaboration among multiple drones without expensive force sensors.

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Key Features:

• Environmental information acquisition module that obtains environmental data, including obstacle information along the route from the starting point to the destination for shared cargo.
• Flight path generation module that generates the flight path for each aerial manipulator offline based on obstacle information.
• Server communication module that transmits the flight paths to each of the multiple aerial manipulators.
• Flight path learning module that discretizes the flight path and calculates gains using the least-squares method to create a smooth trajectory.

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This invention was developed with support from the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy for the development of drone automation and vision-based operation technology for high-precision aerial manipulation.