Approximation-based adaptive control for a class of mobile robots with unknown skidding and slipping

An adaptive tracking control approach using function approximation technique is proposed for trajectory tracking of Type (2,0) wheeled mobile robots with unknown skidding and slipping in polar coordinates and at the dynamic level. The nonlinear disturbance observer (NDO) is used to estimate a nonlinear disturbance term including unknown skidding and slipping. The adaptive control system is designed via the function approximation technique using neural networks employed to compensate the NDO error. It is proved that all signals of the controlled closed-loop system are uniformly bounded and the point tracking errors converge to an adjustable neighborhood of the origin regardless of large initial tracking errors and unknown skidding and slipping. Simulation results are presented to validate the good tracking performance and robustness of the proposed control system against unknown skidding and slipping.