Binocular vision navigation algorithm for AAR of flying boom UAV

Aiming at the estimation problem of relative position and attitude of autonomous aerial refueling(AAR) of flying boom UAV in close formation stage, the relative pose estimation algorithm based on binocular vision is studied. The algorithm uses Harris method to extract feature points and quickly matches them. The 3D coordinates of feature points in camera coordinate system are obtained by Sampson method, and the objective function is established with the minimum square sum of reconstructed error. The position and pose parameters are solved by unit quaternion method. Finally simulation platform is used to verify the effectiveness of the algorithm. Results show the relative position error is better than 0.1 m, the relative attitude error is less than 0.5°, and the accuracy meets the requirements of AAR relative navigation performance.