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String stability and guaranteed safety via funnel cruise control for vehicle platoons

Thomas Berger, Bart Besselink

TL;DR

The paper addresses safe and efficient platoon control for autonomous vehicles with nonlinear, heterogeneous dynamics under limited communication. It introduces a novel decentralized controller inspired by funnel control, guaranteeing a prescribed safety corridor $d_{ m min}<x_{i-1}-x_i<d_{ m max}$ and achieving practical velocity string stability using only local measurements ($x_i-x_{i-1}$, $v_i$, $v_{i-1}$). A rigorous main result proves global existence and uniform bounds for the closed-loop system under bounded disturbances and model assumptions, provided the funnel gain parameter $k_2$ is chosen sufficiently large; these bounds are independent of the platoon length $N$. Simulations with 20 vehicles under extreme leader maneuvers validate safety guarantees, good traffic flow, and attenuation of leader velocity variations along the platoon, highlighting the method’s practicality and decentralized nature.

Abstract

We study decentralized control strategies for platoons of autonomous vehicles with heterogeneous and nonlinear dynamics. Based on ideas from funnel control, we present a novel decentralized control algorithm which is able to guarantee a safety distance between any two vehicles, a good traffic flow and it achieves string stability of the controlled platoon. We illustrate the performance of the controller by simulations of two extreme scenarios.

String stability and guaranteed safety via funnel cruise control for vehicle platoons

TL;DR

The paper addresses safe and efficient platoon control for autonomous vehicles with nonlinear, heterogeneous dynamics under limited communication. It introduces a novel decentralized controller inspired by funnel control, guaranteeing a prescribed safety corridor and achieving practical velocity string stability using only local measurements (, , ). A rigorous main result proves global existence and uniform bounds for the closed-loop system under bounded disturbances and model assumptions, provided the funnel gain parameter is chosen sufficiently large; these bounds are independent of the platoon length . Simulations with 20 vehicles under extreme leader maneuvers validate safety guarantees, good traffic flow, and attenuation of leader velocity variations along the platoon, highlighting the method’s practicality and decentralized nature.

Abstract

We study decentralized control strategies for platoons of autonomous vehicles with heterogeneous and nonlinear dynamics. Based on ideas from funnel control, we present a novel decentralized control algorithm which is able to guarantee a safety distance between any two vehicles, a good traffic flow and it achieves string stability of the controlled platoon. We illustrate the performance of the controller by simulations of two extreme scenarios.
Paper Structure (9 sections, 1 theorem, 57 equations, 4 figures, 1 table)

This paper contains 9 sections, 1 theorem, 57 equations, 4 figures, 1 table.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Nomenclature
  3. Vehicle dynamics
  4. Control objective
  5. Organization of the present paper
  6. Decentralized control design
  7. Main result
  8. Simulations
  9. Conclusion

Key Result

Theorem III.4

Consider a platoon of $N$ vehicles with dynamics eq:Sys and initial conditions eq:IC, where $x_0 \in C^2(\mathbb{R}_{\ge 0},\mathbb{R})$ is the position of the leader vehicle and $v_0 := \dot x_0$. Furthermore, let Assumptions Ass1--Ass3 hold. Then there exists a sufficiently large $k_2>0$ (independ

Figures (4)

  • Figure 1: Framework for the control of a vehicle platoon
  • Figure 2: Error evolution in a funnel $\mathcal{F}_{\psi}$ with boundary $\psi(t)$.
  • Figure 3: Simulation, under controller \ref{['eq:SSFCC']}, of system \ref{['eq:Sys']} with 20 vehicles following a leader in Scenario 1 and parameters as in Table \ref{['Tab:Param']}.
  • Figure 4: Simulation, under controller \ref{['eq:SSFCC']}, of system \ref{['eq:Sys']} with 20 vehicles following a leader in Scenario 2 and parameters as in Table \ref{['Tab:Param']}.

Theorems & Definitions (4)

  • Theorem III.4
  • proof
  • Remark III.5
  • Remark III.6