Text
                    Chinese Journal of Aeronautics, (2022), 35(4): 320–331

Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics
& Beihang University

Chinese Journal of Aeronautics
cja@buaa.edu.cn
www.sciencedirect.com

Optimal predictive sliding-mode guidance law for
intercepting near-space hypersonic maneuvering
target
Bolun ZHANG, Di ZHOU *
School of Astronautics, Harbin Institute of Technology, Harbin 150001, China
Received 17 November 2020; revised 9 January 2021; accepted 8 April 2021
Available online 5 July 2021

KEYWORDS
Adaptive sliding-mode control;
Near-space hypersonic aircraft;
Neural networks;
Optimal control;
Predictive guidance law

Abstract The design of optimal guidance law for intercepting a near-space hypersonic maneuvering target with bounded inputs is considered. Firstly, a maneuvering model for near-space hypersonic aircraft is given. Then, the aircraft acceleration prediction can be obtained using this model
with two neural networks. By using the target acceleration prediction, which is taken into account
when calculating the Zero Effort Miss (ZEM), an optimal sliding-mode guidance law is proposed to
fulfill the guidance task. An adaptive sliding-mode switch term is designed to deal with actuator saturation and prediction errors. Finally, numerical simulations show that the proposed guidance law
can reduce the energy consumption and the terminal acceleration command of the interceptor effectively.
Ó 2021 Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd. This is
an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction
In recent years, the technique of near-space hypersonic vehicle
has been developed rapidly.1,2 The strong maneuvering nearspace vehicle has brought great challenges to defense technology. For example, the design of a terminal guidance law for
intercepting the near-space hypersonic maneuvering target
whose maximum acceleration is very close to that of the inter* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: zhoud@hit.edu.cn (D. ZHOU).
Peer review under responsibility of Editorial Committee of CJA.

Production and hosting by Elsevier

ceptor missile has become an attractive topic. In order to intercept high-speed and high-maneuverability aircraft, some
researchers studied the cooperative guidance schemes of multiple missiles. For example, Wang et al.3 and Shaferman et al.4,5
used a cooperative guidance strategy, where multiple interceptors attack the target from different directions simultaneously
to reduce the impact of the target’s maneuvering. Shaferman
and Oshman6 proposed a strategy that two interceptors attack
the target at a certain distance apart. The key idea of the strategy is to improve the interception performance of the trailing
missile by the leading missile collecting the superior information. The aforementioned cooperative guidance schemes based
on multiple missile interceptors must cost much more than a
guidance scheme based on a single missile interceptor. Moreover, it is hard to realize the real time communications between
multiple missiles.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cja.2021.05.021
1000-9361 Ó 2021 Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).


Optimal predictive sliding-mode guidance law The cost of a near space interceptor missile must be much more than an endo-atmospheric interceptor missile. Therefore, herein we study the design of a terminal guidance law for a single missile intercepting near-space hypersonic maneuvering targets. In the terminal guidance process of a near space interceptor, its flight path is controlled by reaction control thrusters. So it is necessary to consider the energy optimization of the interceptor. However, there are two main difficulties to design an optimal guidance law in this case. The first one is that traditional optimal guidance laws will become suboptimal when the target is maneuvering.7,8 Especially when the maneuver is strong enough, those guidance laws do not show any advantage over the Proportional Navigation guidance law. The second difficulty is that, in near-space, the maximum value of the acceleration of a near-space hypersonic flight vehicle is even close to that of an interceptor missile. This usually causes the saturation of the control input of the interceptor and then the failure of an interception. In addition, The guidance strategies based on game theory was proposed using energy consumption as an indicator of a game.9–11 However, the above game guidance strategies are so complicated that their heavy calculation burden is hard to meet the requirement of real time applications. If the target acceleration can be well predicted and the prediction is applied to the design of a guidance law, the above two difficulties can be overcome. Guo et al.12 introduced the ZEM and Zero Effort Velocity (ZEF) into the design of a guidance law and obtained an optimal solution in a uniform gravitational environment. Tournes et al.13 and Kumar et al.14 designed a predictive guidance law for intercepting ballistic missiles according to the characteristics of ballistic missile in different flight segments. For the near-space interception problem, the above methods are not applicable because the target aircraft is also subject to aerodynamic forces. Therefore, how to predict the acceleration of the near-space aircraft has become the first problem to be solved in this work. The traditional Singer model15 and multi-model filtering methods16,17 can only be used to estimate the acceleration of target, but cannot be used to predict the target acceleration. Aiming at estimating the acceleration of a periodically maneuvering nearspace vehicle, Li and Xiong18 proposed an Adaptive Nonzero Mean Sine Wave (ANM-SW) model. This model is based on the Constant Jerk model, but it needs the prior information on the target maneuvering period and maximum maneuver acceleration. In addition, the model does not propose a method to predict the target states. Maeder et al.19 used Interacting-Multiple-Model (IMM) method to estimate the target states and then extrapolate. However, in the models used in the above two methods, the aerodynamic force, an important factor that affects the flight status of the nearspace vehicle, is not considered. Li et al.20 proposed a trajectory prediction method based on aerodynamic acceleration empirical mode decomposition Li and Jilkov21 introduced a target maneuvering model that includes aerodynamic force to estimate the target accelerations generated by lift and drag, respectively. In order to obtain the prediction of the acceleration of a near-space hypersonic target, we first propose a maneuvering model related to aerodynamic parameters inspired by Li and Jilkov.21 Then, we can get the predicted value by using the aerodynamic parameters to train two neural networks. Recurrent Neural Network (RNN)22 and General Regression Neural Network (GRNN),23 which have good per- 321 formance in learning nonlinear features on time series, are used to complete this task. However, using this method to obtain a more accurate prediction requires a sufficiently long observation time. Therefore, an auxiliary observer is necessary to track the target before the target seeker on the interceptor finds the target. When the predicted value of the target acceleration is obtained, it can be applied into the calculation of the ZEM to obtain the predicted ZEM. Using the predicted ZEM, we can get the analytical expression of the optimal guidance law according to the optimal theory.8 However, due to the errors between the prediction of acceleration and the actual value, the guidance law is required to have strong robustness. A purely optimal guidance law does not have this characteristic. Pang and Wang24 and Dong et al.25 introduced the optimal sliding mode control of uncertain systems. To improve the robustness of an optimal guidance law, Zhou et al.26 combined optimal control with sliding-mode control and proposed an optimal sliding-mode guidance law. Wang et al.27 proposed a stochastic sliding mode guidance law based on optimal control theory considering measurement noise. Refs.26,27 had ignored a very important feature (actuator saturation), which always causes performance deterioration and even system instability in practical systems. Goebel28 and Lebedev29 considered the saturation problem of optimal control and sliding mode control respectively. There is also a problem worth noting that the disturbance, caused by the prediction error in the ZEM dynamic equation, is a function related to the acceleration prediction error and time to go. Therefore, it is difficult to have priori knowledge on its upper bound. Zhu et al.30 applied an adaptive sliding mode control method to aircraft attitude control system where the adaptive sliding-mode term solves the problems of parameter uncertainty and unknown disturbance. In this work, we consider designing an adaptive sliding mode switch term to deal with the prediction error and actuator saturation. This paper is organized as follows. In Section 2, a new maneuver model for the near-space vehicle is given. Based on the model, a method for predicting the target acceleration is introduced. In Section 3, by decoupling the 3-dimensional nonlinear guidance model, an optimal sliding mode guidance (OSMG) law is introduced. By designing an adaptive sliding mode switch term, the stability of the guidance law is ensured in the presence of prediction errors and actuator saturation. Then, some numerical simulations in Section 4 demonstrates the effectiveness of OSMG law. Finally, some concluding remarks will be made in Section 5. 2. Prediction of target acceleration The acceleration of a near-space hypersonic flight vehicle are generated by aerodynamic force. It has various forms of maneuver with long periods. Some traditional maneuver models, such as Singer model,15 Constant Acceleration (CA) model,19 and Constant Jerk (CJ) model,18 are difficult to exhibit the property of the maneuver of a near-space hypersonic vehicle. This makes it difficult to predict the future accelerations of a near-space hypersonic vehicle by using a traditional maneuver model even if the acceleration can be estimated via using this model. In this section, we introduce a maneuver model in terms of aerodynamics to predict the accelerations of a near-space aircraft by iterative calculations.
322 B. ZHANG, D. ZHOU For a near-space vehicle, the acceleration is generated by the aerodynamic force, which is projected into the flight path coordinate system. The origin of the flight path coordinate system is located at the target mass center. The Xfli-axis points to the direction of target velocity, the Yfli-axis is perpendicular to the Xfli-axis and located in the plane which contains the Xfliaxis and is vertical to the horizontal plane, and the Zfli-axis is determined according to the right-handed rule. In addition, the prediction of the target acceleration needs to be completed by a filtering and predicting algorithm. The value of the predicted acceleration is related to the observation inertial coordinate system, which is presented in Fig. 1. The origin ‘‘O” of the inertial coordinate system is located at the position of the observer (radar). The Y-axis is the connection between the earth center and the observer while the positive direction pointing to the sky. The X-axis is perpendicular to the Y-axis and located in the plane containing the earth center, the observer and the initial target position. The Z-axis is determined according to the right-handed rule. Firstly, three state variables are introduced as 8 Zx ¼  CmxTS > > < C S Zy ¼ myT ð1Þ > > : Z ¼ Cz S z mT where Cx ; Cy ; and Cz are three coefficients of the components of aerodynamic force along the flight path coordinate system, mT is the mass of the target, and S is the equivalent reference area of the target. Choose the state variable as  T X ¼ x; y; z; vx ; vy ; vz ; Zx ; Zy ; Zz , where ½x; y; zT is the target position vector under the inertial coordinate system,  T and vx ; vy ; vz is the velocity vector. Suppose Zx ; Zy ; and Zz are slow time-varying random variables. The target model under the inertial coordinate system can be written as 8 x_ ¼ vx > > > > > y_ ¼ vy > > > > > _ ¼ vz z > > > > > > < v_x ¼ aTx ¼ ax  gx ð2Þ v_y ¼ aTy ¼ ay  gy > > > v_z ¼ aTz ¼ az  gz > > > > > > Z_ x ¼ kZx þ wx > > > > > > Z_ y ¼ kZy þ wy > : _ Zz ¼ kZz þ wz In Eq. (2), k is a positive constant; wx ; wy ; and wz are white noises, representing slow time-varying random processes; 2 3 2 3 Zx ax 1 6 7 7 i 6 ð3Þ 4 ay 5 ¼ qv2 Cfli 4 Zy 5 2 az Zz and 2 3 2 lx pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ffi 3 3 7 6 gx 7 6 lðyþRe Þ 7 6 7 6 pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ffi g ¼ 4 gy 5 ¼ 6 3 7 2 2 2 6 ðx þðyþRe Þ þz Þ 7 5 4 lz gz pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ffi ðx2 þðyþRe Þ2 þz2 Þ 3 ðx2 þðyþRe Þ2 þz2 Þ ð4Þ Fig. 1 Inertial coordinate system and line of sight coordinate system. represent the acceleration vectors generated by aerodynamic forces and gravity, respectively, where q is the density of air, qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi v ¼ v2x þ v2y þ v2z is the velocity of the target, l ¼ 3:98199  1014 ; Re is the earth radius, and Cifli is the transform matrix from the flight path coordinate system to the inertial coordinate system, which can be calculated by the following equation: 2 3 coshcoswv sinhcoswv sinwv 6 7 Cifli ¼ 4 sinh cosh 0 5 ð5Þ coshsinwv sinhsinwv coswv and ( vy ffi h ¼ arctan pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi 2 2 vx þvz wv ¼ p þ arctan vvxz ð6Þ In Eq. (3), the target acceleration is in terms of parameters q; v; Cifli ; and the gravity g. Substituting Eqs. (3) and (6) into Eq. (2), the maneuvering target model can be written as 8 x_ ¼ vx > > > > > y_ ¼ vy > > > > > > _ ¼ vz z > >  > > > _ ¼ 1 qv2  ðZx cosh  coswv  Zy sinh  coswv þ Zz sinwv v > > x 2 > lx > qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ffi > > > 3 > 2 þðyþR Þ2 þz2 x > ð Þ e > > >  > < lðyþRe Þ ffi v_y ¼ 12 qv2  ðZx sinh  Zy cosh  qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi 3 2 x þðyþRe Þ2 þz2 Þ ð > > >  > > > v_z ¼ 12 qv2  ðZx cosh  sinwv þ Zy sinh  sinwv þ Zz coswv > > > > lx > ffi  qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi > > 3 > 2 > x þðyþRe Þ2 þz2 Þ ð > > > > > > Z_ x ¼ kZx þ wx > > > > > Z_ y ¼ kZy þ wy > > > : _ Zz ¼ kZz þ wz ð7Þ Eq. (7) is a nonlinear model. It is natural to use the Extended Kalman Filtering (EKF) method to estimate X.
Optimal predictive sliding-mode guidance law State equations and measurement equations can be described as ( X_ ¼ fðXÞ þ W ð8Þ Y ¼ hðXÞ þ V In Eq. (8), X 2 R9 ; Y 2 R3 is the measurements of observer, W and V are white noise matrixes, fðXÞ is the state equation matrix determined by Eq. (7), and hðXÞ is the measurement matrix given by 3 2 x 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7 6 hðXÞ ¼ 4 0 y 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 0 0 z 0 0 0 0 0 0   ^ ¼ x^; y^; z^; v^x ; v^y ; v^z ; Z^x ; Z^y ; Z^z T for the The estimate X state X in the target tracking phase can be obtained by the EKF. According to Eq. (7), if the predicted values Zxp ; Zyp ; and Zzp of Zx ; Zy ; and Zz can be obtained, then the predictions of target position, target velocity, and target acceleration can be calculated step by step. In this paper, the subscript ‘‘p” represents the prediction of the corresponding variable. Without loss of generality, take the calculation of Zzp as an example to introduce the process of obtaining Zxp ; Zyp ; and   Zzp . Firstly, use the estimate sequence Z^z ðtÞ; p0 P t P k0 , which has been obtained in the target tracking phase, as the input of a neural network, where k0 is a reliable instant used to judge whether the filter has reached a steady state and to prevent the unreasonable estimated values affecting the neural network, and p0 is the instant when the prediction starts. Then, the neural network will output a time-related function Zzf ðtÞ. When t > p0 , Zzf ðtÞ is regarded as the predicted value of Zz , i.e., Zzp ¼ Zzf ðtÞ; t > p0 ;. Definition 1. k0 is the reliable instant, if the following equations 8 Z^ ðk þ1ÞZ^ ðk Þ >  z 0Z^z ðk0 Þ z 0  < d > > >  > > > ÞZ^z ðk0 þ1Þ < Z^z ðk0 þ2 <d ^ Z ðk þ1Þ z 323 Z^z ðk þ 1Þ is the residual, i.e., E(k), which is the input of GRNN. The output of the GRNN Ep(t), is the prediction of the residual EðkÞ. The prediction Zzf ðtÞ contains the preliminary prediction and residual prediction. Similarly, we can get Zxp and Zyp . Applying Zxp , Zyp and Zzp into Eq. (7), we can get the predictions of the target accel T  T erations aTp ¼ aTxp ; aTyp ; aTzp ¼ v_xp ; v_yp ; v_zp . This prediction method requires just the target position measurements continuing for a long enough period of time. Simulations under different scenarios show that when using this model to estimate the states of a near-space target, it takes about 30 s for each axial acceleration estimation error converging to a bound within 1 m=s2 . Details about this part will be explained in Section 4. In the terminal guidance stage, it is difficult for the interceptor to obtain the acceleration prediction of the target by itself, and so an auxiliary radar is required to observe the target and then send the target acceleration predictions to the interceptor. Remarks 1. For a near-space hypersonic vehicle in the cruising phase, its maneuverability is provided by aerodynamics. According to Eqs. (1) and (7), it can be seen that the aerodynamic acceleration is related to the aircraft’s position, velocity, aerodynamic coefficient, mass, and equivalent reference area. The mass and the equivalent reference area can be regarded as constants and the aerodynamic coefficient is determined by the aircraft’s velocity, attack angle, and sideslip angle. Compared with Singer model, the model proposed in this paper takes into account the specific factors that affect the acceleration. So, the estimation for target acceleration is more accurate. In addition, it is more reasonable to regard Zx ; Zy ; and Zz instead of acceleration as slow time-varying random processes because in the terminal stage of its cruising phase the aircraft is not liable to change its maneuver scheme due to the constraint on its landing conditions. 3. Optimal sliding-mode guidance law 0 > .. > > > >  > . ^ > : Zz ðk0 þiÞZ^z ðk0 þi1Þ < d Z^z ðk0 þi1Þ hold, where i is a positive integer and d is a positive constant. Herein we use a neural network which combines RNN and GRNN to obtain Zzf ðtÞ. The specific process is shown in Fig. 2. The RNN is used to predict the value of Zz where Zzp1 is a preliminary prediction of Zz . The difference between the preliminary prediction Zzp1 ðk þ 1Þ and the estimated value The line of sight coordinate system (Xlos-Ylos-Zlos), as shown in Fig. 1, depends on the position of the interceptor and the target at the current time. The guidance dynamics in the line of sight coordinate system is represented by 8 > R€ ¼ Rq_ 2e þ Rq_ 2b cos2 qe þ aTR  aIR > > > > 2 > _ > < q€e ¼ 2Rq_ e =R  q_ b cosqe sinqe  ðaIe  aTe Þ=R ð9Þ q€b ¼ 2R_ q_ b =R þ 2q_ e q_ b tanqe þ ðaIb  aTb Þ=Rcosqe > > > > a_ Ie ¼ ðaIe  ue Þ=se > > > : a_ Ib ¼ ðaIb  ub Þ=sb where R is the relative range between the interceptor and the target; qe and qb are the line of sight angles; aTR ; aTe ; and aTb are the target accelerations along the line-of-sight axes; aIR ; aIe ; and aIb are the interceptor accelerations along the line-of-sight axes; ue and ub are the control inputs; se and sb are time constants of the interceptor. In this problem, aIR is not controllable. We convert the nonlinear model (9) to a linear model. Then, the 3dimensional guidance problem becomes two uncoupled 2dimensional problems. Taking the longitudinal plane as an Fig. 2 Process to get the prediction of Zz
324 B. ZHANG, D. ZHOU example, the optimal sliding mode guidance law considering the target acceleration prediction will be introduced. 3.1. Optimal guidance law considering the acceleration prediction t ð11Þ where tf is the final interception time, ð12Þ and R_ can be estimated from the model in Section 3. That is because the velocities of the interceptor and the target are mainly in the line-of-sight direction. Additionally, it is necessary to get the prediction of target acceleration aTep . In Section 2, we obtain the prediction of target acceleration aTp , which is defined under the inertial coordinate system, and aTep can be calculated easily as follows: 2 3 aTRp 6 7 l ð13Þ 4 aTep 5 ¼ Ci  aTp aTbp where 2 cosqe cosqb 6 sinq cosq l Ci ¼ 4 e b sinqb sinqe cosqe 0 3 cosqe sinqb sinqe sinqb 7 5 ð15Þ wðtgo =se Þ ¼ expðtgo =se Þ þ ðtgo =se Þ  1 The relative dynamics between the interceptor and the target in the longitudinal plane are shown in Fig. 3, where qe0 is the initial line-of-sight angle and Ze is the component of the current relative range perpendicular to the initial line of sight. To apply the theory of optimal guidance law, the purpose of control is to make the predictive ZEM converge to 0. The predictive ZEM is defined as Z tf Z s ZEMep ðtÞ ¼ Ze þ Z_ e  tgo  aIe s2e wðtgo =se Þ þ aTep ðs1 Þds1 ds t t Z tf Z s ¼ R_ q_ e t2go  aIe s2e wðtgo =se Þ þ aTep ðs1 Þds1 ds tgo ¼ R=R_ _ ep ðtÞ ¼ ue se wðtgo =se Þ ZEM where When qe and qb are small, we can get the linearized dynamic model of Eq. (9) in the longitudinal plane as follows: ( q€e ¼ 2R_ q_ e =R  ðaIe  aTe Þ=R ð10Þ a_ Ie ¼ ðaIe  ue Þ=se t Then, we can get ð14Þ cosqb is the transform matrix from the inertial coordinate system to the line of sight coordinate system ð16Þ 8 According to Ref. , the energy optimal guidance law ueopt can be obtained as ueopt ¼ Nopt ZEMep t2go ð17Þ where Nopt ¼ 6ðtgo =se Þ2 wðtgo =se Þ 2 3 3 þ 6ðtgo =se Þ  6ðtgo =se Þ þ 2ðtgo =se Þ  3expð2tgo =se Þ  12ðtgo =se Þexpðtgo =se Þ ð18Þ Remarks 2. The existing optimal guidance laws for intercepting a maneuvering target usually ignore the target acceleration during the design process, i.e., the ZEM is defined as ZEMðtÞ ¼ R_ q_ e t2go  aIe s2e wðtgo =se Þ ð19Þ To compensate for the target acceleration, an additional compensation term is introduced into the guidance law, which makes the guidance law suboptimal. The suboptimal guidance law is designed as uesopt ¼ Nopt ZEM þ a^Te t2go ð20Þ where a^Te is the estimated value of the target current acceleration. But in this work, considering the characteristics of the near-space vehicle, we directly use the target acceleration predictions to design the optimal guidance law. Remarks 3. The third term in Eq. (11) is the integral of the target acceleration prediction, which is difficult to be calculated. If qe  qe0 holds, the integral term can be obtained through the acceleration prediction model (7). Firstly, we can get the predicted target position at the final time, i.e., h iT xp ðtf Þ; yp ðtf Þ; zp ðtf Þ which has been calculated when we predict the target acceleration. Then, let the target acceleration  T prediction in system (7) becomes 0, i.e., v_x ; v_y ; v_z ¼ 0; we can get the non-maneuvering target position at the final time, i.e., Rt Rs ½x0 ðtf Þ; y0 ðtf Þ; z0 ðtf ÞT . The integral term t f t aTep ðs1 Þds1 ds can be approximated as 3 3 2 2  xp ðtf Þ  x0 ðtf Þ 7 6 6 R tf R s a ðs Þds ds 7 l ð21Þ 4 t t Tep 1 1 5 ¼ Ci  4 yp ðtf Þ  y0 ðtf Þ 5 R tf R s ðt Þ  z ðt Þ z a ðs Þds ds p f 0 f Tbp 1 1 t t 3.2. An adaptive sliding-mode switch term to deal with the prediction errors and saturation Fig. 3 2-dimensional guidance geometry. Since the predicted values are used in the optimal guidance law, strong robustness of the guidance law is necessary to deal with prediction errors, estimation errors of the line-of-sight angular rate and the actuator saturation. The sliding-mode control method is a well-established robust control algorithm
Optimal predictive sliding-mode guidance law 325 that can handle bounded matched disturbances with different forms. So, in this work, we design a sliding-mode switch term to deal with the prediction errors and saturation. When there exist prediction errors, the true value of ZEM is Rt Rs ZEMe ðtÞ ¼ Ze þ Z_ e  tgo  aIe s2e wðtgo =se Þ þ t f t aTe ðs1 Þds1 ds R t Rs ¼ R_ q_ e t2  aIe s2 wðtgo =se Þ þ f aTe ðs1 Þds1 ds go e t But we can only get the measurement of ZEMe ðtÞ with prediction errors, i.e., ð23Þ ZEMemea ðtÞ ¼ ZEMep ðtÞ ¼ ZEMe ðtÞ þ d2e ðtÞ R tf R s where d2e ðtÞ ¼ t t ðaTep ðs1 Þ  aTe ðs1 ÞÞds1 ds. The ideal objective is to make the ZEMe ðtÞ converges to 0. However, due to the inability to obtain the value of ZEMe ðtÞ, the above objective cannot be achieved. When the distribution characteristics ^ e ðtÞ can be of d2e ðtÞ are known, the estimated value ZEM obtained by designing an observer. Furthermore, the stability ^ e ðtÞ. theory of stochastic systems can be used to control ZEM However, since d2e ðtÞ contains the information of the target’s future acceleration, it is difficult to obtain its distribution characteristics. Observing the expression of d2e ðtÞ, we can find that it has a special property, i.e., d2e ðtf Þ ¼ 0; which means ZEMep ðtf Þ ¼ ZEMe ðtf Þ. Therefore, the control objective can be converted to make ZEMep ðtÞ converge to 0. When there exist prediction errors and input saturation, the dynamic of ZEMep ðtÞ becomes ð24Þ where d1e ðtÞ ¼ ðaTep ðtÞ  aTe ðtÞÞ  tgo ; satðue Þ ¼ jðue Þ  ue ; where jðue Þ is defined as 8 ue > umax > < umax =ue ; umax 6 ue 6 umax jðue Þ ¼ 1; ð25Þ > : umax =ue ; ue < umax where umax represents the maximum acceleration generated by the interceptor. There exists a constant d that makes the following inequality 0 < d 6 minðjðuÞÞ 6 1 1 1 2 2 ZEM2ep þ d þ c 2 p  ð29Þ  ^ c ¼ d  ^c1 , and d is defined in (26). Its time where d ¼ d  d; derivation is  ^ þ c ^c2^c _ ep  1 d d V_ ¼ ZEMep  ZEM p ¼ ZEMep  ðsatðueopt þ ues Þ  se wðtgo =se Þ þ d1 Þ      ^ZEMep   d ZEMep  þ l c ^cd 6 d  ZEMep  ðueopt se wðtgo =se ÞÞ þ ZEMep d1       ^ZEMep   d ZEMep  þ l c ^cd ^ZEMep   d  l^cd 6 d  ZEMep  ðueopt se wðtgo =se ÞÞ |fflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl{zfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl} 1         ^ZEMep   d ZEMep  þ l c ^cd ^ZEMep  þ dZEMep   d  l^cd |fflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl{zfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflfflffl} 2 ð30Þ According to the optimal control theory, the part 1 in Eq.  (30) is less than 0. Applying c ¼ d  ^c1 into the part 2, we have          dZEMep   d ZEMep   d  l^cd^ZEMep  þ l c ^cd^ZEMep          ¼ d^ZEMep   d  l^cd^ZEMep  þ d  l^cd^ZEMep   ld^ZEMep    ð31Þ ¼ ð1  lÞd^ZEMep    Since l > 1; d^ > 0; we have ð1  lÞd^ZEMep  < 0 if ZEMep –0. The state ZEMep ðtÞ is uniformly asymptotically stable. Above all, ZEMep will converge to 0 with the OSMG law (27). h Similarly, we can design the optimal sliding-mode guidance law in the horizontal guidance plane. Remarks 4. The OSMG law does not avoid the saturation of the control input, but guarantees the stability under saturation, making it possible to take full advantage of the interceptor’s maximum maneuverability. ð26Þ holds. The OSMG law has the following form: ueOSMG ¼ ueopt þ ues V¼ t ð22Þ _ ep ðtÞ ¼ satðue Þ  se wðtgo =se Þ þ d1e ðtÞ ZEM Proof of Theorem 1. Consider the following Lyapunov function: ð27Þ where ueopt is calculated from Eq. (17) and ues is the switch term. Without loss of generality, suppose jd1e ðtÞj has an upper bound d, i.e., jd1e ðtÞj 6 d. Then, the switch term ues can be designed as 8 u ¼ l^cd^  sgnðZEMep Þ=ðse wðtgo =se ÞÞ > > < es   _ ð28Þ d^ ¼ pZEMep  > >   :_ 3 ^ ^c ¼ l^c d ZEMep  where l > 1; p > 0;^c is the adaptive gain, and d^ is the adaptive ^ > 0 and ^cð0Þ > 0. estimate of d. The initial values dð0Þ Theorem 1. For the ZEM system consisting of Eqs. (11) and (24), ZEMep will converge to 0 with the OSMG law (27). Remarks 5. In this work, the essence of OSMG law is to design the optimal guidance law according to the target acceleration prediction and to compensate for the prediction errors via using the sliding mode switch term. However, when the target acceleration is predicted for a long period of time, a large acceleration prediction error may be generated, making the energy consumption even greater than the case where no prediction is used. Therefore, we can adjust the ZEMep to the following form: ZEMep ðtÞ ¼ R_ q_ e t2go  aIe s2e wðtgo =se Þ Z tf Z s t  s1  aep ðs1 Þds1 ds exp þ c t t ð32Þ where c is a positive constant. If we have confidence in the target acceleration prediction, then we may assign a large number to c; otherwise, assign a small number to it. When c ! 1, Eq. (32) is equal to Eq. (11). When c ! 0, Eq. (32) is equal to Eq. (19), meaning the guidance law doesn’t consider the predicted information.
326 B. ZHANG, D. ZHOU 4. Numerical simulations In this section, we select a hypersonic aircraft gliding in nearspace as the target. The lift-to-drag ratio of the aircraft is about 3:1, and the velocity of the aircraft is about 12Mach. The flying altitude is about 30 km to 40 km. The acceleration estimation results for the target are given firstly. Then use the estimated value of the target acceleration and the measurements of line-of-sight provided by the interceptor seeker to estimate the line-of-sight angle rate required by the OSMG law. The simulation results of target state estimation are all compared with the results of using Singer model, ANM-SW model,16 and IMM filter,17 respectively. The target state prediction results will be compared with the IMM prediction method.17 Then, the interceptor uses OSMG law to intercept the target. We consider a more complicated situation, that is, assuming that the target discovers the interceptor and makes an abrupt escaping maneuver with a maximum constant acceleration at ðtf  1Þ s. The interception results under the OSMG law are compared with that under the Augmented Proportion Navigation (APN) law and the Optimal Guidance Law (OGL). Finally, we will discuss the convergence time of the proposed model for state estimation of near-space targets, and analyze the influence of large tracking errors within short tracking time on the predictive guidance law. The maximum value of the interceptor is set to be 25 m=s2 , and the time constants se ¼ sb ¼ 0:1. The starting time of the interceptor’s terminal guidance is taken as t = 0 s. We start estimating the target acceleration from t =  96 s and predicting it from t = 0 s to obtain the ZEMep ðtÞ and ZEMbp ðtÞ. The information of interceptor and target at t = 0 s is shown in Table 1. For simplicity, we use ‘‘new model” to refer to the nearspace vehicle maneuver model proposed in Eq. (7). Fig. 4 shows the estimated values of the target acceleration where it is seen that when Singer model, ANM-SW model, and IMM method are used to estimate the target acceleration, although the initial values are better than the new model, their results are much worse than the new model. Since the aerodynamic force is not introduced in the models, the variances of the estimated value calculated by Singer model, ANM-SW model, and IMM method respectively will be much larger than that of the new model. When using the new model to estimate the target acceleration for 30 seconds, the estimation errors are always less than 1 m/s2. To illustrate this specifically, we regard the value of the target acceleration, i.e., qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi aT ð0Þ ¼ a2Tx ð0Þ þ a2Ty ð0Þ þ a2Tz ð0Þ; as the independent vari- Fig. 4 get acceleration is less than 20 m/s2, the acceleration estimation error converges to a bound less than 1 m/s2 in 40 s. According to Eq. (9), the dynamics of the line-of-sight angular rate includes the target acceleration. Therefore, the more accurate the estimated values of the target acceleration, the more accurate the estimated values of the line-of-sight angular rate can be obtained. Eqs. (11) and (17) indicate that the realization able, and the time for the acceleration estimation error converging to a required bound, i.e., tes ; as an indicator to measure the convergence time of the new model. Fig. 5 shows the relationship between at ð0Þ and tes while Z^x ð0Þ; Z^y ð0Þ; and Z^z ð0Þ equal to 0. The sampling interval of aT ð0Þ in Fig. 5 is 0.5 m/s2. As shown in Fig. 5, when the initial value of the tar- Table 1 Estimations of target acceleration. Initial information of interceptor and target. Aircraft x(m) y(m) z(m) vx(m/s) vy(m/s) vz(m/s) Interceptor Target 0 75000 0 2500 0 400 1900 3700 30 200 550 500
Optimal predictive sliding-mode guidance law 327 Fig. 5 Time when the acceleration estimation error is stable within 1 m/s2. of OSMG law requires line-of-sight angular rate, but only the line-of-sight can be measured by the seeker of the interceptor. Therefore, it is necessary to estimate the line-of-sight angular rate based on the estimated value of the target acceleration. Fig. 6 shows the effects of using different models to estimate target acceleration on the estimation of line-of-sight angular rate. It can be seen that the effect of using the acceleration estimated by the new model to estimate the line-of-sight angular rate is also better. Since the OSMG law also requires target prediction information, it is necessary to predict the target acceleration at the beginning of the terminal guidance process. To study the impact of large estimation errors caused by short state estimation time on prediction and the OSMG law, the following simulations consider the situation that the state estimation is run at the instant 10 s before the interceptor’s terminal guidance process starts. The prediction results of the target acceleration during the terminal guidance phase at t = 0 s is shown in Fig. 7. In the simulations, in addition to the use of neural networks, another method is also used to obtain the acceleration predictions. This method regards the Zxp ; Zyp ; and Zzp as constants during the prediction process, which equals to the last Z^x ; Z^y ; and Z^z obtained before the start of the prediction, respectively. Since only the last information is used and all Fig. 6 the previous information is discarded, this method is greatly affected by the estimation errors at the last moment. In addition, it is difficult to obtain the trend of Zx ; Zy ; and Zz by simply using the estimated values at the last moment. When the prediction horizon is longer, the prediction errors will increase more rapidly. For the situation where the target is tracked throughout the simulation process, it is obvious that the prediction error generated by the IMM method diverges significantly faster than that generated by the new model proposed in this paper, regardless of whether the new model uses a neural network. In the case of tracking the target only 10 s before the start of the terminal guidance process, the acceleration prediction errors will become larger. However, the trend of the acceleration prediction change is closer to the real situation than the acceleration prediction value obtained by the IMM method. Eq. (21) indicates that the prediction errors of the target position at t ¼ tf determine the errors between the predictive ZEM and the true value of ZEM. Denote the position of target at t ¼ tf as ½xðtf Þ; yðtf Þ; zðtf Þ. Fig. 8 shows the predic  tion errors xðtf Þ  xp ðtf Þ; yðtf Þ  yp ðtf Þ; zðtf Þ  zp ðtf Þ as the terminal guidance process proceeds. Since the estimations of the target states and the predictions of the target acceleration are constantly updated, the prediction errors of the ZEM are converging. Next, we use OSMG law, APN law, and OGL in interception simulations. Fig. 9 shows the control inputs under different guidance laws. The trajectories of the interceptor using different guidance laws are shown in Fig. 10. In fact, the OSMG law has a great advantage in energy consumption. To illustrate this specifically, an integral function Rt Je ¼ 0 f k u k2 dt is selected as an index of energy consumption. The energy consumption and final miss distances of the above three guidance laws are shown in Table 2 where the final Miss Distance (MD) under the OSMG law is only 0.16 m while that under the APN law and OGL is 0.69 m and 0.56 m, respectively. Even if the target tracking is carried out 10 s before the start of terminal guidance, the final miss distance is only 0.49 m. Thus, the OSMG law is more accurate than the two other guidance laws. Moreover, the energy consumption is less than the other two guidance laws significantly. However, the larger state estimation errors caused by the shorter state estimation time will significantly increase the final miss distance and energy consumption. Estimations of the line-of-sight angular rate.
328 B. ZHANG, D. ZHOU Fig. 7 Predictions of the target acceleration. For the interceptor working in the near-space, the maneuverability of the interceptor does not have an apparent advantage over the maneuverability of target. From Fig. 9, it is obvious that in the most time of terminal guidance process, the magnitude of acceleration under the OSMG law is less than that under the APN law and OGL, and so the energy consumption in the terminal guidance process under the OSMG law is much less than that under the APN law and OGL. Next, consider a more complicated situation that the target finds the interceptor at ðtf  1Þ s and makes an evasive maneuver. Fig. 11 shows the control inputs of the three guidance laws in this case where the target lateral acceleration aTb after the Fig. 8 Prediction errors of the target final position as the terminal guidance proceeds. evasion maneuver is close to the interceptor’s maximum maneuverability. That makes it difficult to intercept the target. The simulation results of the three guidance laws when the target makes an evasive maneuver are shown in Table 3 where the final miss distance under the OSMG law is only 0.79 m while
Optimal predictive sliding-mode guidance law Fig. 9 329 Control inputs of interceptor. that under the APN and OGL is 3.99 m and 3.07 m, respectively. Thus, the advantage of OSMG law in accuracy is apparent compared with the two other guidance laws. Moreover, the energy consumption is still less than the other two guidance laws in this case with abrupt target maneuver. However, the energy consumption of OSMG law in this case with abrupt target maneuver is obviously larger than that in the previous case without abrupt target maneuver, because the abrupt target maneuver had not been predicted. We have carried out 100 runs Monte Carlo simulation and counted the energy consumptions and the final miss distances of the three guidance laws. The results are shown in Table 4. The subscripts ‘‘min”, ‘‘max” and ‘‘ave” represent the maximum, minimum, and average values, respectively. It is shown in Table 4 that the maximum miss distance under the OSMG Table 2 Simulation results. Guidance law MD (m) Je APN OGL OSMG OSMG (10 s) 0.6966 0.5655 0.1619 0.4917 1781.8 1683.6 1179.9 1588.6 Fig. 11 Table 3 Simulation results when the target makes an evasive maneuver. Guidance law MD(m) Je APN OGL OSMG OSMG(10 s) 3.9959 3.0774 0.7973 2.2616 1881.8 1805.1 1285.7 1744.6 Control inputs of the interceptor when the target makes an evasive maneuver.
330 Table 4 B. ZHANG, D. ZHOU 100 Monte Carlo simulation results. Guidance law MDave(m) MDmax(m) MDmin(m) Jeave Jemax Jemin APN OGL OSMG OSMG(10 s) 4.0018 3.2878 0.6859 2.6178 4.5361 3.9816 0.8271 4.8369 3.1228 2.6652 0.5871 1.6897 1850.9 1788.6 1316.1 1721.1 1902.1 1832.2 1351.4 1840.5 1796.4 1733.7 1235.3 1664.6 law is 0.82 m, while the minimum miss distance under the APN law and that under the OGL is 3.12 m and 2.66 m, respectively. The OSMG law avoids some unnecessary maneuvers so that its control inputs are smaller than that of the other two guidance laws, making the interceptor be more capable of dealing with model errors and abrupt target maneuvers at the final stage of terminal guidance. However, when the time for state estimation is short, a large final miss distance may occur. In addition, the advantage of the OSMG law in energy is no longer obvious. Through the above simulation results, we can conclude that the OSMG law can effectively reduce the energy consumption of the interceptor if the tracking of the target can be carried out at least 30 s before the start of terminal guidance. In addition, it has a great advantage in intercepting maneuvering targets whose maneuverability is comparable to that of the interceptor. 5. Conclusions In this paper, we propose an optimal sliding-mode guidance law based on a target acceleration prediction model. By using the proposed target acceleration prediction model, more accurate estimations for the target acceleration can be obtained, and this is also beneficial to obtain more accurate line-ofsight angular rate estimations. By using the neural networks to predict the trend of variations of aerodynamic parameters, the prediction of target acceleration is obtained and applied to designing the optimal sliding-mode guidance law. There are three main advantages for the designed guidance law. (A) The stability of the guidance system in the presence of prediction errors and actuator saturation is guaranteed by introducing an adaptive sliding-mode switch term. The switch term also improves the robustness of optimal control. As a result, for intercepting a maneuvering target, especially a target with an abrupt target maneuver, the OSMG law has a smaller final miss distance than the APN law and OGL. (B) This guidance law makes the interceptor avoid unnecessary maneuvers by using the predicted information, and so the energy consumption is much less than other guidance laws without using the predicted information. (C) In most time of the terminal guidance process, the control inputs under OSMG law is smaller, making the interceptor be more capable of dealing with model errors and the abrupt target maneuver at the final stage of terminal guidance. 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