Geometric approach for intercontinental formation flight path planning
XU Xiaoha · Beijing Hangkong Hangtian Daxue xuebao · 2015
For intercontinental formation flight path planning problem,a basic model was developed based on the aerodynamic models and spherical metric characteristics of formation flight. The problem was then abstracted as the weighted geodesic Steiner minimum tree( WGSMT) problem in spherical point set due to its topological characteristics. The principles of simplifying WGSMT to a finite geometry planning problem were proposed. We also proved that the connecting points induced by obstacles only changed the topology of their adjacent Steiner points while did not lose the accuracy of solution. Finally,a two stage formation path planning algorithm based on construct-repairapproach was developed,whose validity was verified by an example. Significance of the study is that the sphere geometric fundamentals of intercontinental formation path planning are built,which therefore makes the complexity of the problem depend on the scale of flight set rather than that of geographic grids,thereby reduces the complexity of the problem dramatically.