Exploring hypersonic flight vehicle’s altitude tracking control with attack angle constraints based on barrier Lyapunov function

The engine conditions of the air-breathing hypersonic vehicle propelled by scramjet engine in the high-speed cruise state usually require that vehicle’s AoA should be limited in a constrained scope. The challenges for control in this class of vehicles lie in the constraint on AoA. In this paper an altitude tracking problem under AoA constraint is investigated by using Barrier Lyapunov function. The altitude command is transformed into flight path angle command, thus obtaining the flight path angle control system. Barrier Lyaponve Function is used to design the AoA constrained backstepping controller for the flight path angle tracking system. The relationship between the upper bound of the AoA absolute value and the controller’s parameters is derived and the stability of the BLF backstepping controller is proved. The performance of BLF backstepping controller is compared with classic backstepping controller by the means of simulation of an air-breathing hypersonic vehicle model. The result shows that BLF backstepping controller can limit AoA efficiently and has better performance.