无人机集群研究进展综述

Recent development of unmanned aerial vehicle swarms

集群行为是一种常见于自然界中鱼群、鸟群、蜂群等低等群居生物的集体行为,生物群中的个体仅依靠局部感知作用和简单的通信规则自主决定其运动状态,并且从简单的局部规则涌现出协同的整体行为。受此启发,提出了无人机集群作战的概念。无人机集群作战是指依靠大量低成本、速度快、适应能力强、易于携带和投射的无人机形成规模优势,从而取得战争的主动权。由于无人机集群技术的重要战略地位,中美俄等军事大国均开始重视无人机集群技术的持续发展。介绍了无人机集群的研究动机,从模型、协议和平台3个角度总结了研究方法,重点分析了几种典型作战模式以及涉及的若干关键技术。综上所述,集群技术在军事方面具有重要的应用价值,必将引领全新的作战模式。

Swarm as a typical collective behavior is omnipresent in animal kingdom,such as fish schooling,bird flocking,and bee swarming.In a colony,large-scale synchronous behavior emerges by virtue of local sensing and very simple communication rules.Inspired by these collective performances,the swarm of unmanned aerial vehicles is proposed as a new combat pattern.These unmanned aerial vehicles are characterized by large quantity,low cost,high speed,well adaptability,and convenient carried/launched mechanism,contributing to the scale advantage of UAVs and the possession of war initiative In recent years,many military powers,such as China,Russia,United States,have made great effort to the continuous development of swarm-related technology of unmanned aerial vehicles.To resolve the swarming problem of unmanned aerial vehicles,this paper introduces the research motivations of UAVs,summarizing the research approaches from modeling,control protocol,and execution platform.Besides,several classical combat modes and involved key technologies are discussed in detail.Above all,the swarm-related technology has bright application potential in the military area,leading to a brand new combat pattern.