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Hindawi

Journal of Sensors
Volume 2018, Article ID 9678505, 17 pages
https://doi.org/10.1155/2018/9678505

Research Article
Fault-Tolerant Optical Flow Sensor/SINS Integrated Navigation
Scheme for MAV in a GPS-Denied Environment

Zhongyuan Chen ,1 Wanchun Chen,1 Xiaoming Liu ,1 and Chuang Song2


1
School of Astronautics, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
2
Science and Technology on Complex System Control and Intelligent Agent Cooperation Laboratory, Beijing Electro-Mechanical
Engineering Institute, Beijing 100074, China

Correspondence should be addressed to Xiaoming Liu; liuxiaoming_bh@163.com

Received 18 May 2018; Accepted 13 August 2018; Published 20 September 2018

Academic Editor: Paolo Bruschi

Copyright © 2018 Zhongyuan Chen et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution
License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is
properly cited.

An integrated navigation scheme based on multiple optical flow sensors and a strapdown inertial navigation system (SINS) are
presented, instead of the global position system (GPS) aided. Multiple optical flow sensors are mounted on a micro air vehicle
(MAV) at different positions with different viewing directions for detecting optical flow around the MAV. A fault-tolerant
decentralized extended Kalman filter (EKF) is performed for estimating navigation errors by fusing the inertial and optical flow
measurements, which can prevent the estimation divergence caused by the failure of the optical flow sensor. Then, the
estimation of navigation error is inputted into the SINS settlement process for correcting the SINS measurements. The results
verify that the navigation errors of SINS can be effectively reduced (even more than 9/10). Moreover, although the sensor is in a
state of failure for 400 seconds, the fault-tolerant integrated navigation system can still work properly without divergence.

1. Introduction contains egomotion information relative to the environment


of the flying insects [4].
In recent years, unmanned air vehicles have been widely used On the other hand, the requirement for more self-reliant
in military and civil fields. State-of-the-art navigation (autonomous) navigation systems and the need for MAV
schemes for unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) typically rely with a greater understanding of their environment are
on the high-quality global position system (GPS). However, becoming more and more urgent. It is obvious that insects
the GPS signal is not always available (indoor places, for like honeybees, even with their small brains and limited intel-
example), so the overreliance on GPS is becoming a promi- ligence, have the accurately autonomous navigation ability
nent insufficiency of UAVs [1]. As a result, the increasing described above. Accordingly, bioinspired optical flow sen-
interest in navigation for a GPS-denied environment has sors are developed with the advantage of smaller size, lighter
heightened the need for novel GPS-free integrated navigation weight, low power requirement, higher frequency, and lower
schemes. Inspired by flying insects (e.g., honeybees) that have cost compared to other equipments such as lidar, radar, and
the ability to fly with great agility, scientists hope that micro magnetometer [5].
air vehicles (MAVs) could fly like the insects without the aid Chahl [6] has also pointed out that the largest develop-
of GPS signals [2]. Experiments show that one of the naviga- ment opportunities may exist in small and micro UAV
tion information sources is measuring the moving velocity of domains as a result of the novelty of aerospace engineering
the image in the world appearing in the eye when honeybees on a small scale. Therefore, autonomous navigation or pose
fly to their destination [3]. Researchers think that what the estimation using optical flow sensors is valuable for MAVs.
honeybees are mainly relying on is the apparent motion of This has motivated many researches into optical-flow-based
the objects in their field of view, namely, optical flow, which MAV navigation systems and algorithms.
2 Journal of Sensors

Ruffier and Franceschini [7] have developed an optical oOF

flow regulation loop-based MAV which is able to take off, xOF

(Optical axis)
cruise, and land automatically. The MAV can also react f
appropriately to wind disturbances. This MAV can keep
(Image plane)
the downward optical flow at a constant value. Further-
more, the two-degree-of-freedom (DOF) tethered MAV
was shown to land safely on a platform set into motion yOF p(x,y,f)

2
along two directions, vertical and horizontal, without

H/
ground height or groundspeed information [8]. The results
show that their MAV works very well. However, the MAV W/2
zOF
has only two DOF, which is a little far from the 6 DOF
practical MAV.
As stated earlier, the optical flow contains the egomotion PG(xG, yG, zG)

information of honeybees or MAVs. Consequently, it is a rea-


sonable navigation frame that combines the optical flow and
the inertial navigation system (INS) measurement informa-
tion in order to improve the navigation precision. Figure 1: Perspective projection model of an optical flow sensor.
Sabo et al. [9] performed an approach for bioinspired
navigation using optical flow. Hallway navigation results
show that the roll, pitch, and thrust can be tuned and con- are carried out for validating the effectiveness of the naviga-
trolled as expected. The deficiency is that the optical flow tion algorithm.
was calculated off-board using a computer vision algorithm, The rest of this paper is organized as follows. Section 2
rather than taking advantage of optical flow sensors with introduces the mathematical model of optical flow sensors.
small computation and short response time. The optical flow sensor/SINS integrated navigation algo-
Zhang et al. [10] fused strapdown inertial navigation sys- rithm based on the extended Kalman filter (EKF) is described
tem (SINS) information with optical flow through a Kalman in Section 3. Section 4 gives the optimal placement scheme of
filter for correcting the SINS attitude when it is diverged. multiple optical follow sensors fixed on a MAV. Section 5
Simulation results show that the estimated vehicle attitude presents an application of the centralized EKF. A fault-
is of good performance with smaller error. Nevertheless, the tolerant integrated navigation scheme is proposed in Section
placement scheme of optical flow sensors is not shown in this 6. In the last section, the author arrives at the conclusion that
paper. In addition, it is considered that the pitch angle is the fault-tolerant optical flow sensor/SINS integrated naviga-
sinusoidal, yet the roll angle and yaw angle are all zero, which tion algorithm is effective.
is a little far from the practical situation.
In order to overcome the drift of INS, Shen et al. [11] 2. Optical Flow Sensor Model
designed an INS/optical flow/magnetometer integrated navi-
gation scheme for a GPS-denied environment. The gyro, The magnitude of optical flow is defined as the angular rate at
accelerator, and magnetometer information is properly fused which a point on an object point moves relative to an optical
for estimating the attitude of the MAV. The results show that flow sensor. The perspective projection model of the optical
the proposed scheme can effectively reduce the errors of nav- flow sensor [10, 11] is illustrated in Figure 1.
igation parameters and improve navigation precision. How- 2.1. Optical Flow Definition. Let PG = xG , yG , z G T be a point
ever, too many devices are involved in navigation, and the on the ground in the three-dimensional optical flow sensor
corresponding functions can be realized only by fusing opti- reference coordinate frame SOF oOF xOF yOF z OF . Let the opti-
cal flow and inertial information. cal axis of the optical flow sensor be the Z-axis of the optical
Lyu et al. [12] designed a fault-tolerant filter based on flow sensor coordinate system. f is the focal length and the
optical flow and inertial measurements. The velocity estima- origin oOF is the centre of projection. W and H are the pixel
tion accuracy is greatly improved. In want of perfection, the numbers of the optical flow sensor image plane along the xOF
utilization of optical flow information needs to be further and yOF directions, respectively. The projection of point PG
improved, not only for estimating velocity.
on the image plane is given by
In this paper, a multiple optical flow sensor/SINS on-
board integrated navigation scheme for a GPS-denied envi-
ronment is proposed. Multioptical flow sensors are fixed PG
on the given MAV, referencing an optimal placement p=f , 1
ZG
scheme in order to make the optical flow sensors as sensi-
tive as possible to the motion state change of a MAV. Con-
sidering that the MAV may make a big maneuverer so that Point PG has the following relative motion to the optical
some optical flow sensors may face the sky, which causes flow sensor under the sensor coordinate system SOF :
the failure of optical flow sensors, an adaptive decentralized
filter with fault detection and isolation ability is therefore
developed to conquer this problem. 6 DOF flight simulations VG = −TG − ω × PG , 2
Journal of Sensors 3

where ω is the angular velocity and TG the translational com-


ponent of the motion relative to the optical flow sensor. sor
sen
ow
Let (2) be expanded in three dimensions; we get the tical fl Image plane
󴀣
following equation: Op v

V Gx −T Gx 0 −ωz ωy xG f
󴀣
𝜔
V Gy = −T Gy − ωz 0 −ωx × yG

V Gz −T Gz −ωy ωx 0 zG O
3 s
−T Gx + ωz yG − ωy z G Len

= −T Gy − ωz xG + ωx z G

−T Gz + ωy z G − ωx yG d
𝜃
h
Taking the derivative of both sides of (1) with respect
to time, the relation between the velocity of PG in the 󴀣
optical flow sensor coordinate system and the velocity or n
the optical flow of p in the image plane [13] is obtained.
P
f low V z −P V
≙v = f G G 2 G z 4
Δtime zG
Figure 2: An optical flow sensor is moving relative to its object
plane at a velocity v, a height above the ground h, and a yaw rate
Let (4) be expressed in x and y components, we get ω. The angle between the optical axis and the plumb line is θ. f is
the focal length of the optical flow sensor.
V Gx f V Gz xG
vx = f − , 5
zG z 2G
of the optical axis) experienced by the optical flow sensor at
velocity v and rotational rate ω is [14]
V Gy f V Gz yG
vy = f − 6
zG z 2G
v − v ⋅ n n
Substituting (3) into (5) and (6), the following equa- OF = +ω× n , 8
d
tions are achieved:

T Gz x − T Gx f ωx xy − ωy x2 where d is the distance between the object point and the opti-
vx = − ωy f + ωz y + ,
ZG f cal flow sensor in direction n .
7 For a simple example, Figure 2 depicts an optical flow
T Gz y − T Gy f ωx y2 − ωy xy sensor moving relative to its object plane at a right veloc-
vy = + ω x f − ωz x + ,
ZG f ity v, a height above the ground h, and a yaw rate ω. The
angle between the viewing direction (the direction of the
where vx and vy are the optical flow components on direc- optical axis) of the optical flow sensor and the plumb line
is θ. The optical flow OF detected by the optical flow sensor
tions x and y, which can be calculated by a matching algo-
in the plane formed by the optical axis and the velocity
rithm, such as the sum of absolute differences (SAD).
vector is [5]
When an optical flow sensor is mounted on a MAV flying
in a three-dimensional space, the optical flow is a function of
the MAV motion state (translation states vx , vy , vz and rota- v cos θ θ
OF = + ω = v cos2 + ω 9
tion states ωx , ωy , ωz ) and the distance d from the optical flow h/cos θ h
sensor to the object point, as shown in Figure 2.
In order to make the optical flow sensor work prop- The physical unit of OF in (8) and (9) is “rad/s”.
erly, the object plane should have adequate texture, and
it should be sufficiently illuminated for the sensor to distin- 2.2. Reference Coordinate Systems. In order to describe the 6
guish and track features. The optical flow sensor measures DOF motions of a blended wing body [15] MAV with multi-
only two quantities which are the x and components of the ple optical flow sensors in three-dimensional space, three
mean optical flow within its field of view. The local optical reference coordinate systems as can be seen in Figure 3 [16]
flow vector OF in the viewing direction n (i.e., the direction are defined.
4 Journal of Sensors

xOF yOF COF OF b


n = Cb Cn , 11
zb
OOF rbOF
Ob yb where Cbn is the transformation matrix from the local coordi-
zOF nate system Sn to the MAV body coordinate system Sb .
xb
2.3. Expression of Optical Flow in Three-Dimensional Space.
rnOF As the measurements of optical flow sensors are based
rnb on the optical flow sensor coordinate system SOF , the motion
states of the MAV in the inertial coordinate system Sn
Zn
need to be projected onto the optical flow sensor coordinate
On
system SOF .
yn Therefore, based on the coordinate systems defined in the
xn above section, the optical flow experienced by an optical flow
sensor in Figure 3 is
Figure 3: Three coordinate systems used for modelling the blended
wing body MAV [17]. rnb , rbOF , and rnOF are used to express the
relative position of the origin of each coordinate system. VnOF OF,x
+ ωnOF OF,y
OFx d OFg
OFOF = = , 12
(i) Navigation coordinate system (Sn − on xn yn z n ): a OFy VnOF OF,y
− ωnOF
local ENU (east-north-up) frame fixed to a world is d OFg OF,x

selected as the navigation frame. Absolute motion


states of the MAV are defined in this frame. If the
rotation of the Earth is neglected, the ENU reference where OFx and OFy are the x and y component magnitude of
coordinate system can be considered as an inertial OF defined in (8), which are the measurements of the optical
coordinate system. flow sensor. VnOF and ωnOF are the velocity and rotation rate
of the optical flow sensor in the inertial frame Sn , respectively.
(ii) MAV body coordinate system (Sb − ob xb yb z b ): a
Subscripts OF, x and OF, y denote the x and y components in
coordinate system fixed on the MAV body. Its origin
the optical flow sensor coordinate system SOF , respectively.
is the centre of gravity of the MAV body. The Y-axis
d OFg is the distance along z OF from the lens centre of the opti-
is parallel to the longitudinal axis of the MAV body
and points forward. The Z-axis points upward. cal flow sensor to the ground.
Next, we need to find the relationship between the optical
(iii) Optical flow sensor coordinate system (SOF − oOF flow measurements in the optical flow sensor coordinate sys-
xOF yOF z OF ): a coordinate system fixed to a optical tem SOF and the motion state of the aircraft in the inertial
flow sensor. Its origin is the focus of the optical coordinate system Sn .
flow sensor. The Z-axis is the optical axis of the First, the velocity vector of the optical flow sensor in the
optical flow sensor. The X-axis and Y-axis are inertial frame Sn can be expressed as
parallel to the optical flow sensor’s X-axis and
Y-axis, respectively.
drnOF d dr dr
VnOF = = r +r = nb + bOF 13
The transformation matrix from the MAV body coordi- dt dt nb bOF dt dt
nate system Sb to the optical flow sensor coordinate system
SOF is The projection of VnOF in the SOF coordinate system is

cos μ 0 −sin μ VnOF


d rnb n
= C OF
OF n
dt
b = Cy η Cx μ =
C OF sin η sin μ cos η sin η cos μ ,
OF d rbOF
+ Cb b + ωnb × rbOF
cos η sin μ −sin η cos η cos μ dt b b

n V n + C b ωnb
= C OF
10 OF
b × rbOF b
14
where μ and η are the mounting angles of the optical flow
sensor fixed on the MAV. Namely, μ is the angle around As mentioned earlier, the navigation coordinate system
the xb axis for rotating Sb to SOF , and then η is the angle Sn can be considered as an inertial coordinate system, when
around the yb axis. the rotation of the Earth is neglected. Then, it should be
Thus, the transformation matrix from the local coordi- noted that ωnb b is indeed the rotational angular velocity
nate system Sn to the optical flow sensor coordinate system of the MAV in the inertial reference system, which can be
SOF is directly measured by SINS.
Journal of Sensors 5

Second, the direction vector of z OF is defined as k OF ,


rnOF n,z rnb + rbOF
which means that k OF OF = 0 0 1 T . Thus, the projec- d OFg = =− n,z
tion of k OF to Sn is k OF n,z k OF n,z
rnb + C nb rbOF
kOF n = C nOF k OF OF = C nb CbOF kOF 15 =− n ,z b z
17
OF kOF n,z
Therefore, the cosine of the angle between z OF and yn h + C nb rbOF
=− b z
is − kOF n,z , and k OF n,z

kOF n,z = C 13 cos η sin μ − C 23 sin η Third, the rotational angular velocity of the optical flow
16
+ C 33 cos η cos μ, sensor in the optical flow sensor coordinate system is

where C ij is the corresponding element of C bn . ωnOF OF = ωnb OF b ωnb


= C OF b 18
The distance along the axis z OF from the origin of the
optical flow sensor coordinate system SOF (i.e., the focus of Finally, substituting (14), (17), and (18) into (12), the
the optical flow sensor) to the ground is measurements of an optical flow sensor are

n Vn + C b ωnb
C OF OF
k OF × rbOF
− n ,z b b x
+ Cbf ωnb b
h+ Cnb rbOF b z y
OFOF = 19
n Vn + C b ωnb
C OF OF
k OF n ,z b × rbOF b y
− − C bf ωnb b
h + C nb rbOF b z x

The measurement noise of OFOF in (19) is modelled by a process errors of the gyro in SINS; and ∇x , ∇y , ∇z denote
white noise vector with zero mean in the following simula- the random walk process errors of the accelerometer in SINS.
tion, whose variance matrix is R = diag r 2OF r 2OF , where Then, the state equation of the EKF can be represented as
r OF = 0 001 rad/s.
X = FX + Gw, 21
3. Information Fusion Using EKF
In order to improve the precision of SINS, the navigation where F is a 18 × 18 SINS error matrix [17] and G is a 18 × 9
errors are taken as the state vector in this study instead of system noise allocation matrix given by
navigation parameters. This is because the navigation errors
are much smaller than the value of the navigation parame-
ters, and the change of navigation errors is slow. Therefore, 06×3 06×3 06×3
the state transmission of navigation errors can be expressed Cnb 03×3 03×3
accurately with linear equations, and the estimation precision
of the state can be easily guaranteed. G= 03×3 03×3 03×3 22
The state vector is taken as [17] 03×3 I3×3 03×3
03×3 03×3 I3×3
X = δL, δλ, δh, δV E , δV N , δV U , ϕE , ϕN , ϕU ,
T
20
εcx , εcy , εcz , εrx , εry , εrz , ∇x , ∇y , ∇z , ω is the system noise vector with zero mean, that is,

T
where the subscripts E, N, and U stand for the components in ω = ωgx ωgy ωgz ωrx ωry ωrz ωax ωay ωaz ,
the corresponding axis of the east-north-up local coordinate 23
system Sn ; x, y, and z stand for the components in the corre-
sponding axis of the MAV body coordinate system Sb ; δL, δ
λ, δh denote the position errors of SINS; δV E , δV N , δV U where ωgx , ωgy , an ωgz are the gyro random white noises; ωrx ,
denote the velocity errors of SINS; ϕE , ϕN , ϕU denote the atti- ωry , and ωrz are the first-order Markov-driven white noises of
tude errors of SINS; εcx , εcy , εcz denote the random bias errors gyro; and ωax , ωay , and ωaz are the first-order Markov-driven
of the gyro in SINS; εrx , εry , εrz denote the random walk white noises of the accelerometer.
6 Journal of Sensors

Correction of SINS errors (3) Prediction of the Optical Flow Using the SINS
Measurements. Optical flow can be predicted by using
Attitude, position, and velocity (19) with the SINS measurements as the input. δOF is
SINS the difference of the optical flow sensor measurements
and the predicted ideal optical flow. The optical flow
difference δOF is taken as the measurements of EKF. So
Optical flow
prediction X
the measurement equation of EKF is
OFS1 +
EKF
Z = HX + υ, 25
… −
OFSn Optical flow 𝛿OF
where

δOFx
Figure 4: Optical flow sensor/SINS integrated navigation system. Z = δOF = , 26
OFS: optical flow sensor. δOFy

The covariance matrix of system noise vector ω is


H is the measurement matrix [17], and υis the mea-
surement noise vector with zero mean, whose covari-
Q = diag q2ωgx q2ωgy q2ωgz q2ωrx q2ωry q2ωrz q2ωax q2ωay q2ωaz , ance matrix is R = diag r 2OF r2OF where
r OF = 0 001 rad/s.
24
(4) Extended Kalman Filter (EKF). A centralized
extended Kalman filter is first performed in this study
where qωgx = qωgy = qωgz = 10 deg/hour, qωrx = qωry = qωrz = 1
for fusion of inertial and optical flow information. The
deg/hour, and qωax = qωay = qωaz = 0 005 g/hour. state equation of EKF is expressed by (21), and the mea-
The estimated navigation errors are expected to be used surement equation is expressed by (25). The navigation
for correcting the navigation parameters of SINS. There are errors of SINS can be corrected by using the navigation
two methods to correct the navigation parameters [18]: one error estimation feedback of the EKF.
is to directly correct the outputs of SINS by taking the esti-
mated value of the navigation error as the feedback, which 4. Sensor Placement Optimization
is called the output correction method; the other way is to feed
the estimation value of the navigation error into the SINS set- As mentioned in the previous section, multiple optical flow
tlement process, which is called the feedback correction sensors are fixed on the MAV. So the placement scheme of
method. The output correction method only changes the optical flow sensors should be taken into account, which con-
accuracy of the output, rather than the error state inside the sists of the following three issues:
inertial navigation system. In this way, the errors will accu-
mulate gradually over time, making the difference between (a) The positions where the optical flow sensors are
the ideally mathematical model and the actual navigation mounted
system larger and larger, and the accuracy of the integrated (b) The orientations which the optical flow sensors are
navigation system becomes poor. Therefore, the feedback facing
correction method is adopted in this paper in order to
increase the accuracy of SINS. (c) The number of optical flow sensors
Finally, the structure of the optical flow sensor/SINS inte-
4.1. Mounting Position of Optical Flow Sensors. As illustrated
grated navigation scheme based on EKF is shown in Figure 4.
in Figure 3, different rbOF means that the optical flow sensors
It is mainly composed of the following four modules.
are fixed on different positions of the MAV. Several magni-
(1) SINS. The microelectromechanical system- (MEMS-) tudes of rbOF are used for investigating the influence of opti-
based SINS outputs the attitudes, position, and velocity cal flow sensor positions on the navigation performance. The
measurements with drifts and high noises. As time goes placement position and angle of the optical flow sensors in
by, the navigation errors of SINS will gradually increase, the MAV body frame Sb are shown in Tables 1–4. The sensor
so some other navigation devices should take the role of mounting angles in each case are identical.
correcting the SINS errors, such as the optical flow It can be concluded from Figure 5 that the navigation
sensors introduced before. performances of each case are nearly the same, though the
mounting positions of each case are very different. In other
(2) A Group of Multiple Optical Flow Sensors. Multiple words, mounting positions of the optical flow sensors have
optical flow sensors are mounted on a MAV at different little influence on the performance of the navigation system.
positions with different viewing directions. As a result, On the other hand, if the distances between each optical flow
the optical flow information in different directions sensor and the gravity centre of the MAV are as long as pos-
around the MAV can be adequately detected. sible (case 4), the longitudinal velocity navigation error is
Journal of Sensors 7

Table 1: Case 1: optical flow sensors are mounted at the centre of 1


gravity of the MAV.
0.8 0.244
Sensor identifier xb (m) yb (m) z b (m) μ (rad) η (rad)
1 0 0 0 π π/6 0.6 0.242

2 0 0 0 5π/6 0 0.24

𝛿VU (m/s)
0.4 700.5 701 701.5
3 0 0 0 7π/6 0
4 0 0 0 π −π/6 0.2

0
Table 2: Case 2: optical flow sensors are mounted closely on the
MAV. −0.2

Sensor identifier xb (m) yb (m) z b (m) μ (rad) η (rad) −0.4


π π/6 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
1 0 0.1 0
t (s)
2 0.1 0 0 5π/6 0
Case 1 Case 3
3 −0.1 0 0 7π/6 0
Case 2 Case 4
4 0 −0.1 0 π −π/6
Figure 5: History of the longitudinal velocity navigation error.

Table 3: Case 3: the coordinate values of the sensor mounting Table 5: Motion state of the MAV at a certain moment and its
positions are half of those in case 4. change.
Sensor identifier xb (m) yb (m) z b (m) μ (rad) η (rad) Pitch Yaw Roll
Velocity Height
1 0 0.1 0 π π/6 Parameters angle angle angle
(m/s) (m)
5π/6 (deg) (deg) (deg)
2 0.38 0 0 0
x0 10 10 5 5 0
3 −0.38 0 0 7π/6 0
π −π/6 Δx0 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1
4 0 −0.1 0

Table 4: Case 4: mounting positions of optical flow sensors are Let ΔOF represent the optical flow sensitivity, the sensi-
wingtips, nose, and tail of the MAV (The distances between each tivity ΔOF can be defined as
sensor and the gravity centre of the MAV are as long as possible.)

Sensor identifier xb (m) yb (m) z b (m) μ (rad) η (rad) ΔOF = g x0 + Δx0 , μ, η − g x0 , μ, η , 28


1 0 0.2 0 π π/6
where x0 is the motion state of MAV at a certain moment and
2 0.76 0 0 5π/6 0 Δx0 is the motion state change of MAV. Here, the motion
3 −0.76 0 0 7π/6 0 state and its change of a MAV for investigating the influence
4 0 −0.2 0 π −π/6 of mounting angles on the sensor sensitivity are shown in
Table 5.
Based on the current state shown in Table 5, the mount-
ing angles μ and η change from 120 to 240 degrees and −60 to
slightly smaller than the ones in other cases, which means
60 degrees, respectively. The relationship between the mea-
that the navigation performance is slightly better.
suring sensitivity and the mounting angles of optical flow
sensors is illustrated in Figure 6. The results indicate that
4.2. Mounting Orientation of Optical Flow Sensors. We expect when the optical flow change is the most obvious (in other
that the optical flow sensors can be as sensitive as possible to words, when the sensitivity of the optical flow sensor is the
the motion state changes of MAV. From (15), (16), (17), (18), highest), the ranges of mounting angles are
and (19), it can be found that the magnitude of optical flow is
a function of the MAV motion state x and the optical flow μ ∈ 130° , 185° ∩ η ∈ −50° , −30° ,
sensor mounting angles μ, η . Thus, 29
μ ∈ 175° , 225° ∩ η ∈ 30° , 50°

4.3. Number of Optical Flow Sensors. As we know, more opti-


OF = OF2x + OF2y = g x, μ, η , 27 cal flow sensors provide more measurement information,
and the redundancy of the navigation system can also be
enhanced, making the system more reliable. However, too
where g · is a function of x, μ, and η. much information input from optical flow sensors will
8 Journal of Sensors

×10−3 Table 6: Optimal placement scheme of the optical flow sensors.


𝛿OF
240 3
230 Sensor identifier xb (m) yb (m) z b (m) μ (rad) η (rad)
2.5
220 2 1 0 0.2 0 π π/6
210 5π/6
1.5 2 0.76 0 0 0
200
190
1 3 −0.76 0 0 7π/6 0
𝜇 (deg)

0.5
180
0
170 Table 7: Initial parameters of the simulation.
160 −0.5
150 −1 Parameter Magnitude
140 −1.5 Sampling period 0.01 s
130 −2 Random bias of the gyro in
10 deg/h
−40 −20 0 20 40 60 SINS
𝜂 (deg) Random walk process noise
standard deviation of the 0.005 g (g = 9 8 m/s2 )
Figure 6: The relationship between the sensitivity and the accelerometer in SINS
mounting angles of optical flow sensors.
Initial position λ = 120° , L = 30° , h = 1000 m
Initial attitude ϑ = π/6 rad, γ = 0 rad,
(pitch, roll, and yaw) ψ = π/4 rad, ψ = π/4
18 V E = 200 m/s,V E = 200 m/s
Initial velocity
16 ,V U = 0 m/s

14 Initial error state X0 = 0


0.6
12 0.4
10 Taking the longitudinal velocity error as an example, the
𝛿VU (m/s)

0.2
8 0
results shown in Figure 7 indicate that, with the aid of optical
600 650 700 750 800 flow information, the navigation error is obviously smaller. If
6
the number of optical flow sensors is more than one, the nav-
4 igation error will be further reduced, about 1/10 of the navi-
2 gation error from the one optical flow sensor-aided inertial
0 navigation system.
Moreover, if the quantity of optical flow sensors is greater
−2
0 200 400 600 800 100 1200 than two, the navigation performance of the integrated nav-
t (s) igation system is the same as the inertial navigation system
aided with two optical flow sensors. Considering the naviga-
SINS 3_OFS tion accuracy, computational cost, payload mass, and redun-
1_OFS 4_OFS
dancy, three optical flow sensors are recommended to be
2_OFS
mounted on the MAV.
Figure 7: The influence of the optical flow sensor amount on the In summary, the optimal placement scheme shown in
estimation performance. The blue, red, yellow, purple, and green Table 6 is that three optical flow sensors are mounted on
curves are the navigation errors of SINS only, one optical flow the MAV, as far apart as possible from each other and the
sensor-aided, two optical flow sensor-aided, three optical flow gravity centre of the MAV. The optimal mounting angles
sensor-aided, and four optical flow sensor-aided inertial can be referred to Formula (29).
navigation system, respectively.
5. Numerical Simulation Using a
Centralized EKF
increase the computational burden of the on-board com-
puter on MAV. As a result, the real-time performance of To test the performance of the optical flow sensor/SINS inte-
the integrated navigation algorithm may fall. Moreover, too grated navigation scheme, three optical flow sensors are
many optical flow sensors will also increase the payload mass mounted on the MAV using the optimal placement scheme
of MAV. In contrast, too few optical flow sensors will lead to shown in Table 6. Some other initial parameters for this sim-
poor estimating accuracy of the EKF filter. ulation can be seen in Table 7.
Different quantities of optical flow sensors are fixed on Navigation errors of the optical flow sensor/SINS inte-
the MAV for investigating the influence on the navigation grated navigation scheme using a centralized EKF compared
performance. The first one, the first two, the first three, and with the navigation system using SINS only are displayed in
all optical flow sensors in Table 4 are installed on the MAV Figure 8. The results indicate that the navigation errors
in turn. (including position, velocity, and attitude errors) become
Journal of Sensors 9

1 300

𝛿VE (m/s)
𝛿L (deg)

200
0.5 100
0
0 −100
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)
300

𝛿VN (m/s)
𝛿𝜆 (deg)

0.5 200
0 100
−0.5 0
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)
300 20

𝛿VU (m/s)
200
𝛿h (m)

100 0
0
−100 −20
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)

SINS only SINS only


Optical flow sensor aided Optical flow sensor aided
(a) (b)
2
𝜙E (deg)

1
0
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)
0
𝜙N (deg)

−0.5
−1
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)
5
𝜙U (deg)

−5
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)
SINS only
Optical flow sensor aided
(c)

Figure 8: Navigation errors of SINS only and optical flow sensor-aided integrated navigation system: (a) position errors, (b) velocity errors,
and (c) attitude errors.

much smaller after optical flow sensors aided. The correct- As can be seen in Figure 9, the navigation error
ness and effectiveness of the optical flow aided inertial navi- immediately diverges, when one of the optical flow sen-
gation scheme are verified. sors fails. Accordingly, an integrated navigation scheme
In contrast, the premise that the optical flow sensor with fault detection and isolation ability is proposed in the
can work well is that the detection plane has sufficient subsequent sections.
texture, and the illumination is sufficient. Hence, if the
MAV makes a big maneuver, some optical flow sensor(s) 6. Fault-Tolerant Integrated Navigation Scheme
may face the sky, which leads to the failure of optical
flow sensors as a result of zero measurement. In this 6.1. Decentralized Filter. There are two ways to achieve an
case, the navigation system will diverge, suffering from optimal integrated navigation system based on the extended
inputting wrong information. Kalman filter technology: one is centralized Kalman filter,
For example, let the output of the third optical flow sen- and the other is decentralized Kalman filter.
sor in Table 6 be zero from 300 s to 700 s; the longitude error The centralized Kalman filter is the method used in the
of the integrated navigation system using centralized EKF is previous sections, which utilizes only one Kalman filter to
illustrated in Figure 9. process all the information of all the navigation subsystems
10 Journal of Sensors

0.25 N, m) times that of the integrated navigation system;


0.2 γi satisfies the principle of information conservation
equation, that is,
0.15
0.1 1 1
+⋯+ = 1,
0.05 γ1 γN
𝛿𝜆 (deg)

30
0 1
0≤ ≤1
−0.05 γi
−0.1
−0.15 (2) The process noise covariance matrixes of local filters
−0.2 Fault zone and the master filter are set to γi times that of the
−0.25 combined system process.
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)
(3) Each local filter obtains the local estimation by pro-
cessing its own measurement information.
Normal estimatation
Divergent estimatation (4) The local estimation of each local filter and the esti-
mation of the master filter are integrated according to
Figure 9: Centralized EKF will rapidly diverge if one optical flow
sensor fails (e.g., when the output of the optical flow sensor is zero).
N
̂ g = Pg 〠 P−1
X ̂
ii X i ,
(SINS and optical flow sensors). The centralized EKF inte- i=1
grates the SINS subsystem with the optical flow sensor sub- −1
31
N
systems optimally to estimate the navigation error state and Pg = 〠 P−1 ,
ii
then correct the SINS subsystem by using the optimal estima- i=1
tion of the navigation error state. Thus, navigation precision
can be improved relative to the navigation system using the
where X ̂ i is the ith local state estimation and Pii is the
SINS only.
The decentralized filter used in this study is a feder- corresponding estimated covariance matrix. The
ated filter. By using the principle of “information distribu- local estimates are not related to each other, namely,
tion,” the best compromise can be obtained through Pij = 0 i ≠ j . X̂ g is the global optimal estimate, whose
adjusting the distribution weights of subsystem informa- corresponding covariance matrix is Pg .
tion in the navigation system. Therefore, the federal filter
used in this project can achieve the following advantages (5) The global optimal estimate is used to reset the state
against the centralized filter: estimation and covariance matrix of local filters and
the master filter.
(1) The fault-tolerant performance of the decentralized The determination of the information distribution coeffi-
filter is better. When one or more navigation subsys- cient βi = 1/γi is crucial to the decentralized filter [19]. In this
tems fail, the fault can be detected and isolated. After-
study, considering the fault tolerance and computational
wards, the remaining normal navigation subsystems
complexity of the decentralized filter, the information distri-
can be reassembled or reconfigured quickly to get
bution coefficient of the master filter is βm = 0, and the infor-
the required accurate filtering solution.
mation distribution coefficient of each local filter is βi = 1/N
(2) For the centralized filter, the increase in state dimen- (i = 1, 2, … , N, m). Therefore, the estimation of the master
sion will bring the so called curse of dimensionality, filter is actually the global estimation, namely,
which makes the computational cost increase dra-
matically. In addition, reducing the filter dimension ̂m = X
̂ g = Pg P−1 ̂ −1 ̂
X 1 X 1 + ⋯ + PN X N 32
will lose the filtering accuracy and even cause filtering
divergence. As for the decentralized filter, the synthe-
sis (fusion) algorithms of both local filters and the 6.2. Fault Detection and Isolation. In the fault-tolerant inte-
master filter are simple, with less computation, so grated navigation system, the validity of the measurement
as to facilitate the real-time implementation of the information of each local filter must be determined in real
navigation algorithm. time so as to determine which local state estimations are used
to calculate the global state estimation. This requires that a
Referring to Figure 10, the workflow of the federated filter real-time fault detection and isolation algorithm should be
can be summarized as follows: performed in the local filtering process. As a result, once a
fault is detected, the fault can be isolated. Consequently, by
(1) The initial estimated covariance matrixes of local reconstructing the system information, the whole navigation
filters and the master filter are set to γi (i = 1, 2, … , system will not fail due to the failure.
Journal of Sensors 11

X̂g, Pg
SINS
ˆ ,P 𝛾
X g g 1
Master filter
ˆ ,P
X
Z1 1 1
OFS1 Local EKF1
Time
X̂g, Pg 𝛾2 propagation X̂g, Pg

Z2 X̂2, P2
OFS2 Local EKF2
Optimal
X̂g, Pg 𝛾n fusion update

X̂n, Pn
OFSn Zn Local EKFn

Figure 10: Block diagram of the decentralized filter.

A discrete system model with failure is expressed by When a fault occurs, the mean of residual r k is no lon-
ger zero. Therefore, by monitoring the mean of residuals,
Xk = Φk,k−1 Xk−1 + Γk−1 Wk−1 , it is possible to determine whether the navigation system
33 has failed.
Zk = Hk Xk + Vk + f k,φ γ, The fault detection function is defined as

where Zk ∈ Rm is the measurement of the navigation system. λk = rTk A−1


k rk , 39
Xk ∈ Rn is the system state. Φk,k−1 ∈ Rn×n is the one-step
transformation matrix of the system state. Γk−1 ∈ Rn×r is where λk is subject to χ2 distribution with m degrees of free-
the system noise matrix. Wk ∈ Rr and Vk ∈ Rm are mutually dom, namely,
independent Gauss white noise sequences with the following
constrains: λ k ∼ χ2 m , 40

E Wk = 0, E Wk WTj = Qk δkj , where m is actually the dimension of measurement Zk .


34 Here, m = 2.
E Vk = 0, E Vk VTj = Rk δkj , Finally, the fault criteria are as follows:

if λk > T D , a f ault occurs,


where δkj is the Dirac δ function. γ is a random vector, 41
which indicates the degree of a fault. f k,φ is a piecewise if λk ≤ T D , no f ault occurs,
function
where the preset threshold T D is determined by the false
0, k ≥ φ, alarm rate P f . Given the false alarm rate P f = α, the χ2 distri-
f k ,φ = 35 bution can give out the threshold value T D .
1, k < φ, In this study, P f = α = 0 001 and m = 2, then according to
the χ2 distribution, the threshold value T D = 13 82.
where φ is the occurrence moment of the fault. As each local filter is designed for the measurement infor-
Here, the residual χ2 detection method is used to detect mation from each optical flow sensor, the fault detection and
and isolate the faults of the navigation system. isolation algorithm in the local filter can be used for detecting
The residual of each local Kalman filter is the invalid measurement information and the corresponding
local error state estimation. Using the remaining correct local
̂ k/k−1 ,
rk = Z k − Hk X 36 state estimation, the reliable state estimation of the whole
navigation system can be obtained according to the decentra-
̂ k/k−1 is
where the forecast value X lized filter proposed above. The structure of the above pro-
posed fault-tolerant optical flow sensor/SINS integrated
̂ k/k−1 = Φk/k−1 X
X ̂ k−1 37 navigation scheme is shown in Figure 11.
6.3. Numerical Simulation Using the Fault-Tolerant
It can be proved that the residual of Kalman filter rk is a Integrated Navigation Algorithm. As before, three optical
Gauss white noise whose mean is zero when no fault occurs, flow sensors are mounted on the MAV using the optimal
and its variance is placement scheme shown in Table 6. We assume that the
third optical flow sensor in Table 6 fails (or no apparent tex-
Ak = Hk Pk/k−1 HTk + Rk 38 ture on its detected plane) during 300 s–700 s with zero
12 Journal of Sensors

X̂g, Pg

SINS
X̂g, Pg 𝛾1
Master filter
Fault detection X̂1, P1 𝜆1
OFS1 Z1 Local EKF1
and isolation
X̂g, Pg 𝛾2 Time
propagation X̂g, Pg

Fault detection X̂2, P2 𝜆2


OFS2 Z2 Local EKF2
and isolation
Optimal
X̂g, Pg 𝛾n fusion update

Fault detection X̂n, Pn 𝜆n


OFSn Zn Local EKFn
and isolation

Figure 11: Structure of the fault-tolerant optical flow sensor/SINS integrated navigation scheme.

0.25 450

0.2 400
350
0.15
Optical flow (rad/s)

300

0.1 250
200
𝜆3

0.05
Zero 150
0 100
50
−0.05
Fault zone 0 Fault zone
−0.1 −50
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)
x component
y component
(a) (b)

Figure 12: The value of fault detection function λ3 sharply increases as soon as the optical flow sensor fails. (a) Measurements of the optical
flow sensor with a fault during 300 s to 700 s. (b) The history value of fault detection function λ3 .

outputs, as can be seen in Figure 12. Some other initial 700 s, the outputs of the third optical flow sensor in
parameters are shown in Table 7. Table 6 are set to zero.
As shown in Figure 12, when the optical flow sensor fails,
(3) “DF-no FDI”: as in the previous case, the outputs of
the value of fault detection function λ3 sharply increases,
the third optical flow sensor in Table 6 are set to zero
much greater than the threshold value T D = 13 82. during 300 s to 700 s. The difference is that the decen-
In the subsequent figures (Figures 13–15), the “fault tralized filter does not have the FDI capability.
zone” is the period that the optical flow sensor fails, and the
normal working state is restored after 700 s. (4) “CF-no fault”: the navigation error history of using
The meanings of legends in each figure are as follows: the centralized filter for MAV navigation. During
the flight of MAV, the optical flow sensors have no
(1) “DF-no fault”: the navigation error of using the fault.
decentralized filter for MAV navigation. During the
(5) “CF-fault”: the navigation error of using the central-
flight of MAV, the optical flow sensors have no fault.
ized EKF for MAV navigation. Of course, the central-
(2) “DF-FDI”: the navigation error of using the decentra- ized filter does not have the FDI capability. During
lized filter with fault detection and isolation (FDI) 300 s to 700 s, the outputs of the third optical flow
capability for MAV navigation. During 300 s to sensor in Table 6 are set to zero.
Journal of Sensors 13

0.01 0.25
Fault zone
0 0.2

−0.01 0.15
0.1
−0.02 Failure of FDI-free filters
0.05
𝛿L (deg)

𝛿𝜆 (deg)
−0.03
0 Effective of the FDI filter
−0.04
Failure of FDI-free filters −0.05
Fault-free
−0.05
−0.01
−0.06 −0.15
−0.07 Effectiveness of the FDI filter −0.2 Fault zone Fault-free
−0.08 −0.25
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)

DF-no fault CF-no fault DF-no fault CF-no fault


DF- FDI CF- fault DF- FDI CF- fault
DF-no FDI DF-no FDI
(a) (b)
40

20 Fault zone

0
𝛿h (m)

−20
Effective of the FDI filter
−40

−60
Failure of FDI-free filters Fault-free
−80
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)
DF-no fault CF-no fault
DF- FDI CF- fault
DF-no FDI
(c)

Figure 13: Position errors: (a) longitude error, (b) latitude error, and (c) height error.

For the centralized filter and decentralized filter without In order to detect the effect of the sampling period on
FDI capability, the global estimation immediately diverges the performance of simulation, the 1200 s MAV flight sim-
when the optical flow sensor fails, causing the failure of the ulation using the flight navigation scenarios proposed in
whole system, namely, “failure of FDI-free filters,” shown in this manuscript are performed in desktop environments
the following figures. In contrast, the decentralized filter with (Intel® Core™ i7-6700 CPU at 3.40 GHz, Matlab R2015a),
the FDI capability can detect and isolate the sensor failure in under different sampling periods (0.1 s, 0.02 s, 0.01 s,
time to make the navigation system work properly, namely, 0.002 s, and 0.001 s). The simulation results are obtained
“effectiveness of the FDI filter” as can be seen in the following from 50 runs of Monte Carlo.
figures. The results verify the correctness and effectiveness of Three navigation schemes are considered in the
the designed fault-tolerant optical flow sensor/SINS integrated simulation:
navigation scheme in the presence of system-level failures. (1) Navigation only based on INS (inertial navigation
In addition, as can be seen in the figures, the curves of system), called “INS only” in Table 8
“DF-no fault” and “CF-no fault” are consistent, and the
curves of “DF-no FDI” and “CF-fault” are consistent, which (2) Optical flow sensor/INS-based integrated navigation
indicates that the centralized filter and decentralized filter scheme using the centralized EKF, called “centralized
are mathematically equivalent. EKF” in Table 8
14 Journal of Sensors

3 60
2 Effectiveness of the FDI filter 50
1 Fault zone
40
0
30
𝛿VE (m/s)

𝛿VN (m/s)
−1
−2 Fault-free 20 Fault-free
−3 10
−4 Failure of FDI-free filters
0
−5 Effectiveness of the FDI filter
Fault zone −10
−6 Failure of FDI-free filters
−7 −20
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)
DF-no fault CF-no fault DF-no fault CF-no fault
DF- FDI CF- fault DF- FDI CF- fault
DF-no FDI DF-no FDI
(a) (b)
1
0.8
Effectiveness of the FDI filter
0.6
0.4 Fault zone
𝛿VU (m/s)

0.2
0 Fault-free

−0.2
−0.4
−0.6
−0.8 Failure of FDI-Free filters

−1
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)

DF-no fault CF-no fault


DF- FDI CF- fault
DF-no FDI
(c)

Figure 14: Velocity errors: (a) eastward velocity error, (b) northward velocity error, and (c) upward velocity error.

(3) Optical flow sensor/INS-based integrated navigation k and for the ith run of Monte Carlo simulation; the
i
scheme using decentralized EKF with FDI (fault same is x̂k but being the estimation of the state.
detection and isolation) ability, called “FDI-EKF” in Taking the RMSE of V N as an example, as indicated
Table 8 from Figure 16, the shorter the sampling period, the
smaller the navigation error. On the other hand, the aver-
Here, two criteria are used for evaluating the simulation age computing time spent in 50 Monte Carlo simulations
performance. One is the computing time and the other is of different navigation algorithms under different sampling
the navigation error. Furthermore, the criterion employed periods is shown in Table 8. It can be found that the shorter
for evaluating the navigation error with respect to the sam- the sampling period, the longer the computation time used
pling period is the RMSE (root mean square error), over M for simulation. When the decentralized EKF with FDI ability
Monte Carlo runs at a given time k, which is defined by is deployed under the 0.001 s sampling period, the computing
time (1911.1021 s) has even exceeded the simulation time
1/2 (1200 s), which means that the navigation algorithm cannot
1 M i i 2
be implemented in real time.
RMSExk = 〠 xk − x̂k k = 1, 2, … , 42
M i=1 Conversely, as can be seen in Table 8, the larger the sam-
pling period, the shorter the computing time. Actually,
increasing the sampling period makes the amount of compu-
i
where superscript i denotes quantities on the ith run. xk tation smaller. However, as shown in Figure 16, if the sam-
denotes the truth of one of the MAV motion states at time pling period is too long (e.g., 0.1 s), the filter will diverge.
Journal of Sensors 15

0.9 0.1
0.8
0 Failure of FDI-free filters
0.7 Fault-free
Failure of FDI-free filters
0.6 −0.1

𝜙N (deg)
𝜙E (deg)

0.5
−0.2 Fault-free
0.4 Effectiveness of the FDI filter
Effective of the FDI filter
0.3 −0.3
0.2
Fault zone −0.4
0.1 Fault zone
0 −0.5
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s) t (s)
DF-no fault CF-no fault DF-no fault CF-No Fault
DF- FDI CF- fault DF- FDI CF- Fault
DF-no FDI DF-no FDI
(a) (b)
2
1.5 Failure of FDI-free filters Effectiveness of the FDI filter

1
0.5
Fault-free
0
𝜙U (deg)

−0.5
−1
−1.5
−2
Fault zone
−2.5
−3
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200
t (s)
DF-no fault CF-no fault
DF- FDI CF- fault
DF-no FDI
(c)

Figure 15: Attitude errors: (a) roll angle error, (b) pitch angle error, and (c) estimation of yaw error.

period is too long. For the FDI-EKF, after many simulations,


Table 8: Computing time under different sampling periods.
it is found that the navigation scheme can work correctly
Computation time (s) when the sampling period is equal to or less than 0.02 s.
Sampling period (s) As portrayed in Figure 17, when the sampling period
INS only Centralized EKF FDI-EKF
0.1 0.9432 4.1114 —
is reduced from 0.02 s to 0.01 s (i.e., reduced by 1/2), the
navigation error is greatly reduced. However, although fur-
0.02 3.8230 19.0431 95.7955
ther reduction in the sampling period will result in a slight
0.01 7.5288 37.9740 193.7792 reduction in the navigation error, Table 8 indicates that the
0.002 37.9699 188.8640 959.3003 computing time will multiply exponentially, even more than
0.001 74.8733 372.7788 1911.1021 the 1200 s simulation time. Finally, 0.01 s is selected as the
sampling period in Table 7 after the trade-off between the
navigation accuracy and computing time.
Accordingly, a series of sampling periods are employed in
the simulation in order to determine an appropriate one for 7. Conclusions
the optical flow sensor/INS-based integrated navigation
scheme using decentralized EKF with FDI ability (FDI- In this paper, an optical flow sensor/SINS integrated naviga-
EKF). As mentioned above, the filter diverges if the sampling tion scheme for MAV is developed for reducing the
16 Journal of Sensors

80 Data Availability
70 The datasets used or analysed during the current study are
60
available from the corresponding author on reasonable
request.
RMSE of VN (m/s)

50

40 Conflicts of Interest
30 The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest
regarding the publication of this paper.
20

10
Acknowledgments
0
0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 This work was supported by the National Natural Science
t (s) Foundation of China (NSFC) (Grant no. 61403007).
0.1 s 0.002 s
0.02 s 0.001 s
0.01 s
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