Path planning method for UUV homing and docking in movement disorders environment

Abstract

Path planning method for unmanned underwater vehicles (UUV) homing and docking in movement disorders environment is proposed in this paper. Firstly, cost function is proposed for path planning. Then, a novel particle swarm optimization (NPSO) is proposed and applied to find the waypoint with minimum value of cost function. Then, a strategy for UUV enters into the mother vessel with a fixed angle being proposed. Finally, the test function is introduced to analyze the performance of NPSO and compare with basic particle swarm optimization (BPSO), inertia weight particle swarm optimization (LWPSO, EPSO), and time-varying acceleration coefficient (TVAC). It has turned out that, for unimodal functions, NPSO performed better searching accuracy and stability than other algorithms, and, for multimodal functions, the performance of NPSO is similar to TVAC. Then, the simulation of UUV path planning is presented, and it showed that, with the strategy proposed in this paper, UUV can dodge obstacles and threats, and search for the efficiency path. © 2014 Zheping Yan et al.