Conceptual design of an automated control system for a group of unmanned aerial vehicles using the method of category analysis

Abstract

Abstract. Conceptual design of automated control systems (ACS) is an important stage in their development and creation. The miscalculations made here, as a rule, cannot be compensated in the subsequent project stages. Despite this, at the moment there is no sufficiently developed theory of conceptual design of promising ACS. As a rule, when forming the concept (control space) of a new ACS, either use a prototype, or fundamentally new conceptual solutions are developed. The paper presents an attempt to develop a methodology for the conceptual design of an automated control system, which expands the designer’s creative capabilities, streamlining his reasoning and reducing the dimension of the synthesis problem. A template is proposed for creating a parametric concept of ACS with its subsequent detailing through the use of the categorical analysis method. The method is demonstrated on the development example of ACS concept by a group of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV). A constructive scheme of management information, including data groups and relationships between them is considered. Data groups are formed taking into account the multidimensionality of the management process, where aspects (points of view) are generated using the categorical analysis apparatus. The interpretation of 32 categorical subsets is proposed, revealing 32 aspects of the UAV groups usage. On the example of the UAV functioning aspect, concerning the fire and electronic suppression of the enemy’s air defense, performed as an element of combat support for the process of solving the main tasks, the data on the state of the UAV group was detailed. For the formed metric system, groups of information transformation procedures are defined. It is advisable to use the presented results to create adaptive polyaspect special software for ACS by a UAV group.