American Institute of Mathematical Sciences

Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been increasingly used in the context of remote sensing missions such as target search and tracking, mapping, or surveillance monitoring. In the first part of our paper we consider agent dynamics, network topologies, and collective behaviors. The objective is to enable multiple UAVs to collaborate toward a common goal, as one would find in a remote sensing setting. An agreement protocol is carried out by the multi-agents using local information, and without external user input. The second part of the paper focuses on the equations of motion for a specific type of UAV, the quadcopter, and expresses them as an affine nonlinear control system. Finally, we illustrate our work with a simulation of an agreement protocol for dynamically sound quadcopters augmenting the particle graph theoretic approach with orientation and a proper dynamics for quadcopters.

Presented herein are a class of methodologies for conducting constrained motion analysis of rigid bodies within the Udwadia-Kalaba (U-K) formulation. The U-K formulation, primarily devised for systems of particles, is advanced to rigid body dynamics in the geometric mechanics framework and a novel development of U-K formulation for use on nonlinear manifolds, namely the special Euclidean group \begin{document}$ {\mathsf{SE}(3)}$\end{document} and its second order tangent bundle \begin{document}${\mathsf{T}^2\mathsf{SE}(3)} $\end{document}, is proposed in addition to the formulation development on Euclidean spaces. Then, a Morse-Lyapunov based tracking controller using backstepping is applied to capture disturbed initial conditions that the U-K formulation cannot account for. This theoretical development is then applied to fully-constrained and underconstrained scenarios of rigid-body spacecraft motion in a lunar orbit, and the translational and rotational motions of the spacecraft and the control inputs obtained using the proposed methodologies to achieve and maintain those constrained motions are studied.

We prove a Noether's theorem of the first kind for the so-called restricted fractional Euler-Lagrange equations and their discrete counterpart, introduced in [26,27], based in previous results [11,35]. Prior, we compare the restricted fractional calculus of variations to the asymmetric fractional calculus of variations, introduced in [14], and formulate the restricted calculus of variations using the discrete embedding approach [12,18]. The two theories are designed to provide a variational formulation of dissipative systems, and are based on modeling irreversbility by means of fractional derivatives. We explicit the role of time-reversed solutions and causality in the restricted fractional calculus of variations and we propose an alternative formulation. Finally, we implement our results for a particular example and provide simulations, actually showing the constant behaviour in time of the discrete conserved quantities outcoming the Noether's theorems.

The so-called method of phase synchronization has been advocated in a number of papers as a way of decoupling a system of linear second-order differential equations by a linear transformation of coordinates and velocities. This is a rather unusual approach because velocity-dependent transformations in general do not preserve the second-order character of differential equations. Moreover, at least in the case of linear transformations, such a velocity-dependent one defines by itself a second-order system, which need not have anything to do, in principle, with the given system or its reformulation. This aspect, and the related questions of compatibility it raises, seem to have been overlooked in the existing literature. The purpose of this paper is to clarify this issue and to suggest topics for further research in conjunction with the general theory of decoupling in a differential geometric context.

This paper is devoted to rolling motions of one manifold over another of equal dimension, subject to the nonholonomic constraints of no-slip and no-twist, assuming that these motions occur inside a pseudo-Euclidean space. We first introduce a definition of rolling map adjusted to this situation, which generalizes the classical definition of Sharpe [26] for submanifolds of an Euclidean space. We also prove some important properties of these rolling maps. After presenting the general framework, we analyse the particular rolling of hyperquadrics embedded in pseudo-Euclidean spaces. The central topic is the rolling of a pseudo-hyperbolic space over the affine space associated with its tangent space at a point. We derive the kinematic equations, as well as the corresponding explicit solutions for two specific cases, and prove the existence of a rolling map along any curve in that rolling space. Rolling of a pseudo-hyperbolic space on another and rolling of pseudo-spheres are equally treated. Finally, for the central theme, we write the kinematic equations as a control system evolving on a certain Lie group and prove its controllability. The choice of the controls corresponds to the choice of a rolling curve.

Student engagement in learning a prescribed body of knowledge can be modeled using optimal control theory, with a scalar state variable representing mastery, or self-perceived mastery, of the material and control representing the instantaneous cognitive effort devoted to the learning task. The relevant costs include emotional and external penalties for incomplete mastery, reduced availability of cognitive resources for other activities, and psychological stresses related to engagement with the learning task. Application of Pontryagin's maximum principle to some simple models of engagement yields solutions of the synthesis problem mimicking familiar behaviors including avoidance, procrastination, and increasing commitment in response to increasing mastery.