Model Reference Control for Collision Avoidance of a Human-Operated Quadrotor Helicopter

Because quadrotor helicopter has four fixed-pitch rotors, its control system can be much simpler than that of conventional helicopters; thus, it is expected to find wide application in many remote control situations, such as in hazardous environments. This paper proposes a collision avoidance control for a quadrotor helicopter based on the concept of a social force model. The proposed control incorporates commands given from human operators and compensates for operator mistakes in real time to achieve collision avoidance of a quadrotor helicopter. The proposed method uses distance sensors to achieve real-time collision avoidance. Its effectiveness is shown by experimental results, in which the algorithm successfully drives the helicopter along the desired trajectory without a collision.