The underwater detection array composed of underactuated autonomous underwater vehicle(AUV)formation has the fast response,good maneuverability,and high intelligence.For the formation control problem of multi-autonomous underwater vehicles without speed information transmission under the combined disturbance of current and time delay,a formation control method which combines the virtual trajectory,trajectory prediction,and adaptive inversion sliding mode control technique is proposed.The position information of navigator and the expected formation are used to obtain the reference trajectory of follower,and introduce a virtual trajectory to make it coincide with the reference trajectory for a finite time,thereby obtaining the expected position and velocity of the follower.On this basis,the least squares method is used to fit the trajectory curve to compensate for the delay,and to complete the formation trajectory tracking under the interference of current through the adaptive backstepping sliding mode control technology.The theoretical analysis and simulated results indicate that the designed method is feasible and effective.