Liu, Shi QianWhidborne, James F.2021-09-022021-09-022021-08-19Liu SQ, Whidborne JF. (2021) Observer-based incremental backstepping sliding-mode fault-tolerant control for blended-wing-body aircrafts, Neurocomputing, Volume 464, November 2021, pp. 546-5610925-2312https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neucom.2021.08.069https://dspace.lib.cranfield.ac.uk/handle/1826/17050This paper presents an adaptive incremental nonlinear backstepping sliding-mode (INBSM) controller, for fault tolerant tracking control of a blended wing body (BWB) aircraft with unknown disturbances and actuator faults. The INBSM controller is based on a nonlinear dynamics model of the BWB aircraft. In addition, a radial basis function neural network disturbance observer (RBF-NNDO) is proposed to enhance the disturbance attenuation ability. A fault estimator is suggested to improve actuator fault tolerant control level. The closed-loop control system of the BWB aircraft is proved to be globally asymptotically stable using Lyapunov theory. Simulations of the combined NNDO-INBSM controller are presented and compared with both the INBSM design and an adaptive fuzzy controller. The results demonstrate an improved capability of the NNDO-INBSM control for the BWB aircraft to execute realistic attitude tracking missions, even in the presence of center of gravity movement, unknown disturbances, model uncertainties and actuator faults.enAttribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 Internationalhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Robust control of nonlinear systemneural network disturbance observerincremental nonlinear backstepping controlincremental nonlinear dynamic inversionstability augmentation controlArticle