Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Distributed Formation Rotation Control Inspired by Leader-Follower Reciprocation of Migrant Birds

Close formation flying with rotation would extend the flight range of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) swarms. Unfortunately, some complex conditions, such as the non-uniform fuel configuration, irregular formations, and individual accidents, would pose great challenges to the conventional cyclical formation rotation method. Inspired by the direct reciprocity mechanism observed in the migrant birds that the amount of time a bird spends following another is proportional to the duration in turn, this paper proposes a novel approach to address the challenge. First, a leader–follower reciprocation model is constructed, in which each individual will follow identic rules to accept followers and switch among following, leading, and accelerating modes. On such a basis, a distributed formation rotation algorithm is presented to coordinate the UAV swarms to fly in a changing and compact line formation to increase the swarm range under the above-mentioned complex conditions. Numerical simulations are carried out to show the feasibility, validity, and superiority of the algorithm.