Collaborative Marine Targets Search Algorithm for USVs and AAVs Under Energy Constraint

The collaborative search of unmanned surface vessel (USV) and autonomous aerial vehicle (AAV) for tasks with high timeliness or a large number of target points is a current research focus in the field of Marine Internet of Things technology, such as counter-mine search and data collection of ocean sensor nodes. However, the slower navigation speed of USVs cannot meet the timeliness requirements of search tasks. Moreover, AAVs have a short endurance, making it unsuitable for large-area target search missions. Combining the characteristics of long endurance of USVs and the high speed of AAVs, this article propose a heterogeneous collaborative search algorithm based on time sequence constraints (TimeSeries). Initially, a time-sliding window is designed to control the trigger time for each agent to select the next search target point. Only when the current search time of the agent is in the time-sliding window, the conditions for the next search will be satisfied, ensuring the fairness of the search. Second, considering the constraint of limited energy for USVs and AAVs, a mathematical model of energy consumption under the constraint of sea wind and ocean current environment is established, then an objective function based on energy constraint and target weight is designed. Finally, the discretized isomorphic agent collision avoidance constraint strategy and the communication radius constraint strategy among agents based on network topology are added to enhance the robustness of the cooperative system. Finally, several simulation experiments are designed and compared with other algorithms to show the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.