Optimal Coordinated Control for Wing Deformation and Flight State of Morphing Aircraft via Differential Game

Feng Wang, Jun-Wei Wang

Abstract: In this paper, an optimal coordinated control strategy of wing deformation and flight state is proposed for morphing aircraft in the framework of differential game theory. Firstly, an approximate linear model at the equilibrium point is obtained from the nonlinear longitudinal motion model of morphing aircraft by Jacobian linearization method. Secondly, on the basis of the approximate linear motion model, appropriate optimization performance indexes are constructed in the non-cooperative differential game framework, and then the optimal control design problem of wing deformation and flight state is formulated as the solution of coupled algebraic Riccati equations, which can be approximately obtained by cross iteration algorithm. Moreover, we also apply Lyapunov stability theory to strictly analyze the closed-loop stability of nonlinear er ror systems. Finally, numerical simulation results for both variable-wing-span aircraft and variable-wing-thickness one are presented to support the effectiveness and merit of the proposed differential game control strategy.