Nonlinear Path Following Control of an AUV
A new type of control law is developed to steer an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) along a desired path. The methodology adopted for path following deals explicitly with vehicle dynamics. Furthermore, it overcomes stringent initial condition constraints that are present in a number of path following control strategies described in the literature. Controller design builds on Lyapunov theory and backstepping techniques. The resulting nonlinear feedback control law yields convergence of the path following error trajectory to zero. Simulation results illustrate the performance of the control system proposed.