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Trajectory tracking is one of the main control problems in the context of Wheeled Mobile Robots (WMRs). Besides, control of underactuated systems possesses a particular complexity and importance; so it has been focused by many researchers in recent years. In this paper, these two important control subjects are discussed regarding a Tractor-Trailer Wheeled Mobile Robot (TTWMR); which includes a differential drive wheeled mobile robot towing a passive spherical wheeled trailer. The use of spherical wheels instead of standard wheels in trailer makes the robot highly underactuated with severe nonlinearities. Spherical wheels are used for the trailer to increase robots’ maneuverability. In fact, standard wheels create nonholonomic constraints by means of pure rolling and nonslip conditions, and reduce robot maneuverability. In this paper, after introducing the robot, kinematics and kinetics models are obtained, and combined as the dynamics model. Then, based on physical intuition a new controller is developed for the robot, named as Lyapaunov-PID control algorithm. Then, singularity avoidance of the proposed algorithm is discussed and the stability of the algorithm is discussed. Simulation results reveal the suitable performance of the proposed algorithm. Finally, experimental implementation results are presented which verify the simulation results.

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In many wheeled robot applications, in addition to accurate position control, dimensional and weight limitations are also important. The limitation of weight and dimensions means that it is not possible to use arbitrarily large actuators. On the other hand, accurate and fast tracking usually requires high control gains and, as a result, large control inputs. If the control input exceeds the saturation limit of the operator, in addition to increasing the tracking error, it may lead to robot instability in some cases. Therefore, it will be precious to provide a control method that can simultaneously provide high control accuracy and guarantee the robot's stability, taking into account the saturation limit of the actuators (speed and torque) in a predetermined manner. This issue has been addressed in the present study. The proposed control includes two parts: a kinematic controller and a dynamic controller. The kinematic control design is based on the Lyapunov approach, which can adjust the speed saturation limit of the actuators. For dynamic control, the robot velocity components are considered as control reference values ​​and the robot wheel torque is considered as control inputs. In the dynamic control design, the torque saturation limit of the actuators is included in a predetermined way. To evaluate the performance of the proposed nonlinear control, various analyses were performed on the wheeled robot. The results showed that the proposed control algorithm while guaranteeing stability and following the path with high accuracy, has also fully met the requirements of the actuators’ saturation limits