Design and Optimization of a Novel Cooperative Control Strategy for UAV Formation Flight

In an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) formation flight, the wingman UAV is responsible for maintaining a specified formation with the lead aircraft, avoiding collisions with other UAVs in the group, and ensuring that all units reach the designated mission point in alignment with operational objectives. This paper introduces a novel cooperative control strategy specifically designed for UAV formation flights. This approach assures effective following of the lead UAV by the wingman UAVs considering the fully autonomous of each UAV supported by intelligent decision mechanisms. In addition, timely arrival at the mission point in accordance with the mission requirements of all UAVs can be guaranteed. Moreover, safety is prioritized throughout the formation process without compromising mission success. The implementation of this proposed cooperative control approach is shown in this paper, demonstrating autonomous management of UAV formations and ensuring both mission fulfillment and flight safety. Numerous MATLAB-based simulation results have been conducted to validate the proposed methodology, confirming its accuracy and effectiveness.