In navigation applications, the presence of an unknown bias in the measurement of rate gyros is a key performance-limiting factor. In order to estimate the gyro bias and improve the accuracy of attitude measurement, we proposed a new method which uses the rotation of an inertial measurement unit, which is independent from rigid body motion. By actively changing the orientation of the inertial m...

In this paper, we study sensor fusion for the attitude stabilization of Micro Aerial Vehicles (MAVs), in particular mechanical flying insects. Following a geometric approach, a dynamic observer is proposed which estimates attitude based on kinematic data available from different and redundant bio-inspired sensors such as halteres, ocelli, gravitometers, magnetic compass and light polarization c...

We present an algorithm for estimating thruster configurations of underwater vehicles with reconfigurable thrusters. The algorithm estimates each thruster’s effect on the vehicle’s attitude and position. The estimated parameters are used to maintain the robot’s attitude and position. The algorithm operates by measuring impulse response of individual thrusters and thruster combinations. Statisti...

In navigation applications, the presence of an unknown bias in the measurement of rate gyros is a key performance-limiting factor. In order to estimate the gyro bias and improve the accuracy of attitude measurement, we proposed a new method which uses the rotation of an inertial measurement unit, which is independent from rigid body motion. By actively changing the orientation of the inertial m...

Predictive control technique is applied to the three-axis attitude control of spacecraft. The principal idea of predictive control is to construct a priori reference trajectory and build control command so that the actual system follows the reference trajectory. In the case of this study, the controlled variables are the quaternion attitude parameters and angular rates of spacecraft body axes. ...

This paper addresses the problem of attitude estimation in fractionated spacecraft clusters. Each module in the cluster may have either a startracker, a relative attitude sensor, or both. Using results in nonlinear observability theory, we provide graph-theoretic sufficient conditions for the attitude of every module to be observable. In particular we show that the attitude of every module in t...

This paper addresses the problem of deriving attitude estimation and trajectory tracking strategies for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) using exclusively on-board sensors. The perception of the vehicle position and attitude relative to a structure is achieved by robustly comparing a known pier geometry or map with the data provided by a LiDAR sensor, solving an optimization problem and also rob...

This paper presents an algorithm for velocity-aided attitude estimation for helicopter aircraft using a microelectromechanical system inertial-measurement unit. In general, high- performance gyroscopes are used for estimating the attitude of a helicopter, but this type of sensor is very expensive. When designing a cost-effective attitude system, attitude can be estimated by fusing a low cost ac...

Navigation accuracy is one of the key performance indicators of an inertial navigation system (INS). Requirements for an accuracy assessment of an INS in a real work environment are exceedingly urgent because of enormous differences between real work and laboratory test environments. An attitude accuracy assessment of an INS based on the intensified high dynamic star tracker (IHDST) is particul...