Redundancy Resolution based Trajectory Generation for Dual-Arm Aerial Manipulators via Online Model Predictive Control

Abstract

This paper presents a nonlinear model predictive control-based trajectory generation with redundancy resolution strategy for a dual-arm aerial manipulator. The proposed approach continuously re-plans the aerial robot motion to track the position of the dual-arm end-effectors, while satisfying other constraints such as avoiding the obstacles and limits of the motion variables. In addition, the minimum manipulability measure is set to ensure a smooth motion and avoid singular configurations of the aerial robot. The performance of the developed framework is shown via simulations and real-time experimental flight tests, involving the dual-arm aerial manipulator performing non-trivial multi-task missions, which require the coordination of both arms, while keeping the configuration of the aerial robot within imposed bounds and preventing collisions with obstacles.