Real-time Model Predictive Contouring Control via Block Successive Convex Approximation

Abstract

The real-time implementation of model predictive control (MPC) in robotics field is known to be challenging due to the inherent non-convex and nonlinear dynamics involved, as well as the need for a longer prediction horizon for better control performance. This paper presents a real-time model predictive contouring control (MPCC) scheme by utilizing the block successive convex approximation (BSCA) method. By adopting this method, the original computationally intensive non-convex problem can be decomposed into smaller subproblems with explicit solutions. We show the effectiveness and the real-time performance of the proposed method through a wheeled mobile robot path following task using MPCC controller in simulation.