Spatiotemporal coordinated air-to-ground attack strategy of an unmanned aerial vehicle swarm

This paper proposes a spatiotemporal coordinated control method for unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) swarms based on predefined time convergence in response to the coordinated ground attack problem of UAV swarms in a three-dimensional battlefield environment. First, we analyze the UAV swarm’s ground attack task scenario and its relevant elements and establish models for the UAV swarm, ground-moving targets, and attack problems. Building upon problem modeling, this paper considers the spatiotemporal coordinated strategy for a UAV swarm and designs a spatiotemporal coordinated control law for a three-dimensional spatial UAV swarm ground attack. The proposed spatiotemporal coordinated control law can guide the UAV swarm to reach the desired attack position within a specified time, achieving a spatiotemporal coordinated attack on ground-moving targets. A theoretical analysis based on the Lyapunov function demonstrates that the proposed control law can asymptotically stabilize the attack position error variable under a predefined time condition. Simulation results show that the proposed coordinated control law can achieve spatiotemporal coordination of the UAV swarm in a ground-moving target turning motion, enabling the completion of the multiangle coordinated attack on ground-moving targets within a specified time. Currently, research on the coordinated ground attack of UAV swarms mostly focuses on stationary targets, making it difficult to apply to coordinated attack tasks on moving targets. Although the coordinated tracking of moving targets by UAV swarms has been reported in the literature, spatiotemporal coordination among UAVs has not been considered. Therefore, this paper focuses on the spatiotemporal coordinated control strategy of UAV swarms, with a background of coordinated ground attacks by UAV swarms. First, this paper conducts a detailed analysis of the UAV swarm’s coordinated ground attack task in terms of time and multiple elements to establish a comprehensive task profile. Subsequently, by focusing on the core elements of coordinated ground attack by UAV swarms, this paper models both UAV swarms and ground-moving targets. Based on the established models and coordinated control strategy, this paper considers spatiotemporal coordination constraints and designs acceleration commands for each UAV to guide them to reach the specified attack positions at predefined time points, enabling coordinated attacks on the ground targets simultaneously. The designed acceleration control commands serve as inputs to the UAV’s autopilot, further generating lower-level control commands, such as speed, flight path angle, and heading angle, thereby achieving stable flight control of the UAVs. The proposed coordinated control strategy endows the UAV swarm with the capability to achieve spatiotemporal synchronized coordinated attacks, thereby enhancing the operational effectiveness of UAV-coordinated ground attacks.