Multiparameter Numerical Investigation of Two Types of Moving Interactions Between the Deep-Sea Mining Vehicle Track Plate and Seabed Soil:Digging and Rotating Motions

To ensure the safe performance of deep-sea mining vehicles(DSMVs),it is necessary to study the mechanical characteristics of the interaction between the seabed soil and the track plate.The rotation and digging motions of the track plate are important links in the contact between the driving mechanism of the DSMV and seabed soil.In this study,a numerical simulation is conducted using the coupled Eulerian–Lagrangian(CEL)large deformation numerical method to investigate the interaction between the track plate of the DSMV and the seabed soil under two working conditions:rotating condition and digging condition.First,a soil numerical model is established based on the elastoplastic mechanical characterization using the basic physical and mechanical properties of the seabed soil obtained by in situ sampling.Subsequently,the soil disturbance mechanism and the dynamic mechanical response of the track plate under rotating and digging conditions are obtained through the analysis of the sensitivity of the motion parameters,the grouser structure,the layered soil features and the soil heterogeneity.The results indicate that the above parameters remarkably influence the interaction between the DSMV and the seabed soil.Therefore,it is important to consider the rotating and digging motion of the DSMV in practical engineering to develop a detailed optimization design of the track plate.

Automatic Carrier Landing Control for Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Based on Preview Control

For carrier-based unmanned aerial vehicles(UAVs),one of the important problems is the design of an automatic carrier landing system(ACLS)that would enable the UAVs to accomplish autolanding on the aircraft carrier.However,due to the movements of the flight deck with six degree-of-freedom,the autolanding becomes sophisticated.To solve this problem,an accurate and effective ACLS is developed,which is composed of an optimal preview control based flight control system and a Kalman filter based deck motion predictor.The preview control fuses the future information of the reference glide slope to improve landing precision.The reference glide slope is normally a straight line.However,the deck motion will change the position of the ideal landing point,and tracking the ideal straight glide slope may cause landing failure.Therefore,the predictive deck motion information from the deck motion predictor is used to correct the reference glide slope,which decreases the dispersion around the desired landing point.Finally,simulations are carried out to verify the performance of the designed ACLS based on a nonlinear UAV model.

Trajectory Tracking of Vertical Take-off and Landing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Based on Disturbance Rejection Control

We investigate the trajectory tracking problem of vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), and propose a practical disturbance rejection control strategy. Firstly, the nonlinear error model is established completely by the modified Rodrigues parameters, while considering dynamics of the servo actuators. Then, a hierarchical control scheme is applied to design the translational and rotational controllers based on the time-scale property of each subsystem, respectively. And the linear extended state observer and auxiliary observer are used to deal with the uncertainties and saturation. At last, global stability of the closed-loop system is analyzed based on the singular perturbation theory. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy. © 2014 Chinese Association of Automation.

A fast computational method for the landing footprints of space-to-ground vehicles

Fast computation of the landing footprint of a space-to-ground vehicle is a basic requirement for the deployment of parking orbits, as well as for enabling decision makers to develop real-time programs of transfer trajectories. In order to address the usually slow computational time for the determination of the landing footprint of a space-to-ground vehicle under finite thrust, this work proposes a method that uses polynomial equations to describe the boundaries of the landing footprint and uses back propagation(BP) neural networks to quickly determine the landing footprint of the space-to-ground vehicle. First, given orbital parameters and a manoeuvre moment, the solution model of the landing footprint of a space-to-ground vehicle under finite thrust is established. Second, given arbitrary orbital parameters and an arbitrary manoeuvre moment, a fast computational model for the landing footprint of a space-to-ground vehicle based on BP neural networks is provided.Finally, the simulation results demonstrate that under the premise of ensuring accuracy, the proposed method can quickly determine the landing footprint of a space-to-ground vehicle with arbitrary orbital parameters and arbitrary manoeuvre moments. The proposed fast computational method for determining a landing footprint lays a foundation for the parking-orbit configuration and supports the design of real-time transfer trajectories.

Turning traction force of tracked mining vehicle based on rheological property of deep-sea sediment

Based on main physical and mechanical properties of deep-sea sediment from C-C poly-metallic nodule mining area in the Pacific Ocean, the best sediment simulant was successfully prepared by mixing bentonite with a certain content of water. Compression-shear coupling rheological constitutive model of the sediment simulant was established by endochronic theory and the coupling rheological parameters were obtained by compressive and compression-shear creep tests. A new calculation formula of turning traction force of the tracked mining vehicle was first derived based on the coupling rheological model and consideration of pushing resistance and sinkage of the tracked mining vehicle. Effects of the turning velocity, crawler spacing and contacting length of crawler with deep-sea sediment on the turning traction force were analyzed. Research results can provide theoretical foundation for operation safety and optimal design of the tracked mining vehicle.

Predicting the sinkage of a moving tracked mining vehicle using a new rheological formulation for soft deep-sea sediment

The sinkage of a moving tracked mining vehicle is greatly af fected by the combined compression-shear rheological properties of soft deep-sea sediments. For test purposes, the best sediment simulant is prepared based on soft deep-sea sediment from a C-C poly-metallic nodule mining area in the Pacific Ocean. Compressive creep tests and shear creep tests are combined to obtain compressive and shear rheological parameters to establish a combined compressive-shear rheological constitutive model and a compression-sinkage rheological constitutive model. The combined compression-shear rheological sinkage of the tracked mining vehicle at dif ferent speeds is calculated using the Recur Dyn software with a selfprogrammed subroutine to implement the combined compression-shear rheological constitutive model. The model results are compared with shear rheological sinkage and ordinary sinkage(without consideration of rheological properties). These results show that the combined compression-shear rheological constitutive model must be taken into account when calculating the sinkage of a tracked mining vehicle. The combined compression-shear rheological sinkage decrease with vehicle speed and is the largest among the three types of sinkage. The developed subroutine in the Recur Dyn software can be used to study the performance and structural optimization of moving tracked mining vehicles.

A Generic Plug-and-Play Navigation Fusion Strategy for Land Vehicles in GNSS-Denied Environment

Achieving accurate navigation information by integrating multiple sensors is key to the safe operation of land vehicles in global navigation satellite system(GNSS)-denied environment.However,current multi-sensor fusion methods are based on stovepipe architecture,which is optimized with custom fusion strategy for specific sensors.Seeking to develop adaptable navigation that allows rapid integration of any combination of sensors to obtain robust and high-precision navigation solutions in GNSS-denied environment,we propose a generic plug-and-play fusion strategy to estimate land vehicle states.The proposed strategy can handle different sensors in a plug-and-play manner as sensors are abstracted and represented by generic models,which allows rapid reconfiguration whenever a sensor signal is additional or lost during operation.Relative estimations are fused with absolute sensors based on improved factor graph,which includes sensors’error parameters in the non-linear optimization process to conduct sensor online calibration.We evaluate the performance of our approach using a land vehicle equipped with a global positioning system(GPS)receiver as well as inertial measurement unit(IMU),camera,wireless sensor and odometer.GPS is not integrated into the system but treated as ground truth.Results are compared with the most common filtering-based fusion algorithm.It shows that our strategy can process low-quality input sources in a plug-and-play and robust manner and its performance outperforms filtering-based method in GNSS-denied environment.

Switchable shape memory polymer bio-inspired adhesive and its application for unmanned aerial vehicle landing

Controlled and switchable adhesion is commonly observed in biological systems.In recent years,many scholars have focused on making switchable bio-inspired adhesives.However,making a bio-inspired adhesive with high adhesion performance and excellent dynamic switching properties is still a challenge.A Shape Memory Polymer Bio-inspired Adhesive(SMPBA)was successfully developed,well realizing high adhesion(about 337 kPa),relatively low preload(about90 kPa),high adhesion-to-preload ratio(about 3.74),high switching ratio(about 6.74),and easy detachment,which are attributed to the controlled modulus and contact area by regulating temperature and the Shape Memory Effect(SME).Furthermore,SMPBA exhibits adhesion strength of80–337 kPa on various surfaces(silicon,iron,and aluminum)with different roughness(Ra=0.021–10.280)because of the conformal contact,reflecting outstanding surface adaptability.The finite element analysis verifies the bending ability under different temperatures,while the adhesion model analyzes the influence of preload on contact area and adhesion.Furthermore,an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle(UAV)landing device with SMPBA was designed and manufactured to achieve UAV landing on and detaching from various surfaces.This study provides a novel switchable bio-inspired adhesive and UAV landing method.

INERTIAL INTEGRATED SYSTEM OF NORTH SEEKING/SIGHT STABILIZING ON VEHICLE

A brand new method of automatic north seeking/sight stabilizing is introduced for usage in land fighting vehicles such as tank, etc. Some inertial devices are installed additionally on the platform along with relative control circuits to make its function of North seeking possible. Double position calculation is adopted in this method, and by alignment at two sites the azimuth angle can be figured out. Also the orientation and the horizontal shifts of the gyro are simultaneously measured and compensated so as to improve the accuracy of north seeking. The system can automatically seek north when the vehicle is immobile. And the time consumption is no more than 5.5 min. Besides, the system can keep azimuth angle and provide tilt angle and pitch angle of the vehicle.

GUIDANCE AND CONTROL FOR AUTOMATIC LANDING OF UAV

A scheme of guidance and control is presented to meet the requirements for automatic landing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) based on the airborne digital flight control system and radio tracker on ground station. An automatic landing system is realized for an unmanned aerial vehicle. The results of real time simulation and flight test are given to illustrate the effectiveness and availability of the scheme. Results meet all the requirements for automatic landing of the unmanned aerial vehicle.

Multi-objective Optimization Design of Vented Cylindrical Airbag Cushioning System for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

Multi-objective optimization design of the gas-filled bag cushion landing system is investigated.Firstly,the landing process of airbag is decomposed into a adiabatic compression and a release of landing shock energy,and the differential equation of cylindrical gas-filled bag is presented from a theoretical perspective based on the ideal gas state equation and dynamic equation.Then,the effects of exhaust areas and blasting pressure on buffer characteristics are studied,taking those parameters as design variable for the multiobjective optimization problem,and the solution can be determined by comparing Pareto set,which is gained by NSGA-Ⅱ.Finally,the feasibility of the design scheme is verified by experimental results of the ground test.

Tradeoff Analysis of Factors Affecting Longitudinal Carrier Landing Performance for Small UAV Based on Backstepping Controller

Tradeoff analysis of the factors,including external environment and unmanned aerial vehicle(UAV)aerodynamic attributes,which affect longitudinal carrier landing performance,is important for small UAV.First,small UAV longitudinal carrier landing system is established,as well as the nonlinear dynamics and kinematics model,and then the longitudinal flight control system using backstepping technology with minimum information about the aerodynamic is designed.To assess the landing performance,a variety of influencing factors are considered,resulting in the constraints of aerodynamic attributes of carrier UAV.The simulation results show that the severe sea condition has the greatest influence on landing dispersion,while air wake is the primary factor on impact velocity.Among the longitudinal aerodynamic parameters,the lift curve slope is the most important factor affecting the landing performance,and increasing lift curve slope can improve the landing performance significantly.A better system performance will be achieved when the lift curve slope is larger than 2per radian.

Automated Autonomous Vehicles: Prospects and Impacts on Society

All automobile manufacturing companies, Google and Microsoft have announced recently their production of the Fully Automated Autonomous Vehicles (FAAVs), otherwise known as driverless cars. A few FAAVs would be available in the market as early as in 2018, but mostly in 2020’s. When FAAVs will be available to and become affordable by the average consumers, the implications to the society would be far reaching. The purpose of the paper is to examine the prospect of the popularity of FAAVs and their socio-economic implications to the future society of the World. The paper examines potential impacts on selected sectors of the society including changes in demand for automobiles, its impact on the use of oil, on the environment, and on urban land uses, to list a few.

Deep-sea rock mechanics and mining technology:State of the art and perspectives

The review covers the development and the state of the art in deep-sea mining rock mechanics,equipment and challenges.It begins by introducing the significance of deep-sea mining,the types and geographical distribution of deep-sea resources.Section 2 reviews the mechanical properties and fracture mechanism of seabed and related continental rocks,which contributes to the advancement of relevant technologies and theories.Deep-sea mining systems developed by coastal countries are presented in Section 3.Seabed mineral collection systems are critically assessed in Section 4.Subsea mining vehicle is reviewed by walking mechanism and controlling system in Section 5.In Section 6,the development of subsea lifting system is detailed by dividing it into hydraulic and pneumatic lifting modes,and some technical problems in the lifting system are described.An in-depth description of surface support systems is presented in Section 7,which includes the deep-sea mining ship,dynamic positioning system,heave compensation system,launch and retrieval system,mineral disposing system as well as the storage and transferring systems.Section 8 discusses the challenges in the deep-sea mining,in terms of natural occurrence conditions,international legal framework and cooperative mining,environmental protection and economic benefits,etc.Finally,a brief summary and some aspects of prospective research are presented in Section 9.

Video-based construction vehicles detection and its application in intelligent monitoring system

While vehicle detection on highways has been reported before, to the best of our knowledge, intelligent monitoring system that aims at detecting hydraulic excavators and dump trucks on state-owned land has not been explored thoroughly yet. In this paper, we present an automatic, video-based algorithm for detecting hydraulic excavators and dump trucks. Derived from lessons learned from video processing, we proposed methods for foreground detection based on an improved frame difference algorithm, and then detected hydraulic excavators and dump trucks in the respective region of interest. From our analysis, we proposed methods based on inverse valley feature of mechanical arm and spatial-temporal reasoning for hydraulic excavator detection. In addition, we explored dump truck detection strategies that combine structured component projection with the spatial relationship. Experiments on real-monitoring sites demonstrated the promising performance of our system.

发射场地面发射支持系统数字孪生架构及应用

针对航天发射场地面支持系统远程监测诊断、智能维护保养和自主决策控制等应用需求,提出了面向地面发射支持系统的数字孪生参考架构,提炼了实现数字孪生的关键技术。结合我国首型固液捆绑运载火箭塔式吊装对接工作,开发了基于参考架构的运载火箭塔式吊装对接仿真平台。经实际运行考核,该平台基于虚实空间交互映射和实时动力学仿真,通过丰富吊装场景监控信息,能够提高吊装对接工作的安全性和效率;同时,验证了数字孪生参考架构设计的合理性及技术路线的可行性。

不同海况条件下舰载无人机着舰安全分析

针对无人机上舰的使用需求,本文对舰载无人机着舰开展了系统的研究。建立了机-舰-环境综合模型和舰载无人机全自动着舰引导控制系统;基于建立的舰载无人机着舰综合模型对不同海况下的着舰过程进行仿真分析,研究不同海况条件以及航母不同航速和遭遇角对着舰安全的影响。仿真研究表明:在复杂海况下,航母可通过适当提高航速以获得更高的着舰成功率,但过高的航速会导致舰尾流扰动加剧,使得着舰成功率显著下降;通过对仿真结果进行统计分析,给出了不同海况下的着舰安全范围,为无人机着舰辅助决策提供参考。

航母舰载无人机全自动着舰技术特点分析

全自动着舰技术是无人机上舰必须解决的“使能”技术。2013年,美军已完成X-47B无人机验证机在航母上的全自动着舰试验验证,为其发展MQ-25A“黄貂鱼”航母舰载无人机装备奠定了良好的技术基础。在梳理飞机着陆与着舰差异的基础上,给出航母舰载无人机全自动着舰的通用流程;从地位作用、工作范围、系统构架、系统要求、实现手段以及关键技术支撑等角度,对比有人机重点分析了航母舰载无人机全自动着舰的特点,为后续关键技术研究和武器装备建设发展提供参考。

一种多段机翼水面起降地效无人机气动特性

为改善水面起降性能和气动性能,基于船身式机身、多段机翼和T尾融合设计思路,提出并设计了一种新型仿生式多段机翼地效无人机方案,采用N-S方程和K-Ω-SST湍流模型,详细研究了该型无人机在不同状态下的压力云图、压力系数及升阻特性。仿真结果表明,地效作用随离水高度的增加而减小,离水高度与平均几何弦长之比(高度弦长比H/c)接近1时,地效作用较为显著,无人机在离水高度0.2 m时,升力系数、升阻比分别提升21.91%和40.37%,阻力系数降低15.22%;对提出的多段机翼布局,地效飞行主要影响下表面压力系数和压力云图,下表面压力系数展向上由内向外正压增幅逐渐减小,弦向上前后缘附近压力系数较小,结合压力云图分析,地效对升力增幅的影响主要集中在中段和内段机翼下方区域;地效飞行可明显提高升力线斜率(H/c为1时提高了8.89%),迎角增加时升力系数增幅和阻力系数降幅均逐渐变大,升阻比增幅(H/c为1)在迎角2°后均达到26%以上;通过验证机的多轮水面起降和有、无地效飞行试验,证明设计方案具有优秀的气动性能和飞行性能,可为水质检测、水面地效运输、搜救侦察等提供应用平台。

我国低空经济的技术经济范式分析与发展对策

低空经济作为我国战略性新兴产业,具有典型的新质生产力特征。从低空经济的发展看,其符合技术经济范式的一般特征。低空经济发展遵循包含驱动力、新结构与新形态、价值创造活动、价值创造结果四要素的范式。目前,我国低空经济发展总体处于起步阶段,政策风口效应明显,发展前景广阔。依照技术经济范式,从驱动力看,我国正在逐步构建低空技术牵引、低空基础设施保障、低空经济政策助推的驱动力体系;从新结构与新形态看,我国低空经济已经广泛融入农业生产、观光旅游、物流配送、环境监测、应急救援等领域,在信息维度、能量维度、情绪维度的价值不断显现,同时部分城市依托低空经济产业链走出低空经济特色发展之路;从价值创造活动看,我国在低空飞行器制造、低空服务、低空运营维保等领域涌现出一批代表性企业,低空经济的场景和规模不断扩充,价值创造活动前景广阔;从价值创造结果看,近年来我国低空经济规模保持较快增长,在直接带动经济增长的同时展现出降低成本、提高效率、促进就业等社会效益。总体而言,发展低空经济是一项系统工程。尽管我国通用航空发展为低空经济奠定了基础,但与发达国家相比,我国低空经济发展仍然存在诸多不足,顶层设计亟待加强,体制机制有待理顺,技术创新有待加强,场景拓展有待加快,综合成本有待下降,行业保障有待提升。因此,应制定战略规划,统筹低空经济发展,优化低空空域管理,加大财政金融支持,推动低空经济产业链协同发展,加快技术创新与人才队伍建设,加强低空经济基础设施和法规标准体系建设以及安全保障。