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Virginia Tech

A Taguchi-Based Approach to Tune Bio-Inspired Guidance Systems for Tactical UAVs

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

This thesis aims to tune the control parameters of a bio-inspired guidance system designed to confer a tactical behavior to unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). This bio-inspired guidance system is capable of reducing exposure to threats, while traversing previously uncharted, and potentially hostile territories. UAVs employing this guidance system may exhibit a more or less tactical behavior by tuning 9 user-defined parameters within specified intervals. Although the UAV's behavior can be easily forecasted whenever all parameters are set to exhibit the most cautious behavior or the most reckless behavior, it is difficult to devise a taxonomy of flight behavior whenever these parameters are not set at the boundaries of their admissible intervals. The scope of this thesis is to analyze and forecast the UAV's behavior as a function of these user-defined parameters. To this goal, the Taguchi analysis method is employed to deduce those parameters that affect the UAV's behavior more than others. Successively, 81 software-in-the-loop simulations have been performed to analyze the UAV's behavior as a function of the most influential user-defined parameters. Finally, 10 flight tests were performed to validate the numerical results.

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Master of Science
Level thesis:degree_level
masters
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Mechanical Engineering
Department dc:contributor.department
Mechanical Engineering
Grantor dc:publisher
Virginia Tech
Year dc:date.issued
2022

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Amrite, Shardul
Chair dc:contributor.committeechair
  • L'Afflitto, Andrea
Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember
  • Southward, Steve C.
  • Akbari Hamed, Kaveh
  • Tsui, Kwok

Subjects

dc:subject × 4

Rights

dc:rights
Statement dc:rights
  • In Copyright
Language dc:language.iso
en

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Dc Identifier Other
vt_gsexam:33765
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/108089

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
Virginia Tech
Base URL
vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/oai/request
Last updated
2026-07-22
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Amrite, Shardul. A Taguchi-Based Approach to Tune Bio-Inspired Guidance Systems for Tactical UAVs. masters thesis, Virginia Tech, 2022. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/108089