As a promising mode of water transportation, unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) are used in various fields owing to their small size, high flexibility, favorable price, and other advantages. Traditional navigation algorithms are affected by various path planning issues. To address the limitations of the traditional deep deterministic policy gradient (DDPG) algorithm, namely slow convergence speed and sparse reward and punishment functions, we proposed an improved DDPG algorithm for USV path planning. First, the principle and workflow of the DDPG deep reinforcement learning (DRL) algorithm are described. Second, the improved method (based on the USVs kinematic model) is proposed, and a continuous state and action space is designed. The reward and punishment function are improved, and the principle of collision avoidance at sea is introduced. Dynamic region restriction is added, distant obstacles in the state space are ignored, and the nearby obstacles are observed to reduce the number of algorithm iterations and save computational resources. The introduction of a multi-intelligence approach combined with a prioritized experience replay mechanism accelerates algorithm convergence, thereby increasing the efficiency and robustness of training. Finally, through a combination of theory and simulation, the DDPG DRL is explored for USV obstacle avoidance and optimal path planning.

The maritime wireless communication network (MWCN) faces challenges such as limited coverage, inaccurate channel state information (CSI), and the sparse distribution of maritime vessel users. To overcome the above challenges, this paper proposes a low Earth orbit satellite (LEO) MWCN based on rate-splitting multiple access (RSMA) and reconfigurable intelligent surface (RIS). Common data streams transmit broadcast-shared information to all vessel users. Private data streams provide differentiated supplements. The primary optimization objective is to maximize the sum rate. The transmission time is also introduced as a supplementary performance indicator to assess the system’s transmission capability. To overcome the problems of imperfect CSI and the low efficiency of the weighted minimum mean square error (WMMSE) algorithm, a block coordinate descent (BCD) algorithm is proposed based on the deep unfolding method (DU) and momentum-accelerated projection gradient descent (PGD). Numerical results show that DU-WMMSE reduces the number of convergence iterations from 8 to 4, improves the sum rate by 11.06%, and achieves lower transmission time. In addition, active RIS mitigates severe fading more effectively in complex channels. The proposed scheme also exhibits excellent scalability.

This article proposes an adaptive sliding mode fault-tolerant tracking control scheme for underactuated unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) that suffer from loss of effectiveness and increase in bias input when performing path tracking. First, the mathematical model and fault model of USVs are introduced. Then, the USV is driven along the planned path by back-stepping and fast terminal sliding mode control. The radial basis function (RBF) neural network is used to approximate the unknown external disturbances caused by wind, waves, and currents, the unmodeled dynamics of the system, the actuator non-executed portions and bias faults. An adaptive law is designed to account for the loss of effectiveness of the thruster. In addition, through the analysis of Lyapunov stability criteria, it is proved that the proposed control method can asymptotically converge the tracking error to zero. Finally, this paper uses a simulation to demonstrate that, when a fault occurs, the tracking effect of the fault-tolerant control method proposed in this paper is almost the same as that without a fault, which proves the effectiveness of the designed adaptive law.