Phase-preserving barrier projection of rhythmic references for safety-critical quadrotor flight
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Recurring quadrotor missions such as orbit inspection and perimeter sweeping require references that repeat in phase while respecting obstacles and geofence limits. Sending an unsafe periodic reference directly to a downstream safety filter makes the plant-level filter correct the same unsafe command every cycle. This paper formulates a phase-preserving reference projection: at each sample, the nominal oscillator velocity is projected onto the admissible directions of an eroded safe set, while a separate internal clock advances at its prescribed rate. The projected reference is then tracked by an actuator-constrained plant safety filter with a residual-acceleration margin covering wind, mass mismatch, and inner-loop realization error. The analysis proves invariance of the eroded reference set in continuous time, quantifies the effect of both relaxation variables, gives a robust high-order plant safety result, and states a tracking-tube condition connecting the two layers. Full rigid-body simulations use a geometric attitude loop and a 0.01 s main sampling period. In the nominal obstacle scenario, the proposed controller maintains 0.269 m minimum clearance, preserves the full 10.44 rad phase advance, and reduces integrated plant-level intervention by \(45.1\%\) , from 21.855 m/s for plant-only robust filtering to 11.995 m/s. Predictive, governor, and reachability/tube-inspired baselines, a wind sweep, and inertia-mismatch cases are also reported. These numerical results apply to the tested operating envelope; they are not hardware-flight or global intersample-safety claims.
Source: Scientific Reports
Authors: Hajid Alsubaie, Alessandro Astolfi
Language: English
Subfield: Control and Systems Engineering
Field: Engineering
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $2,690
OpenAlex ID: W7208828719
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