Controllability-observability of expanded composite systems

The relation between original and expanded systems within the Inclusion Principle from the point of view of controllability–observability of both subsystems and composite systems is studied. It is proved that complementary matrices always exist ensuring that the subsystems and the overall expanded system are simultaneously controllable–observable. Two practically important large classes of complementary matrices are identified to offer results computationally attractive. First, the existence of complementary matrices ensuring controllability–observability of decoupled subsystems is proved. Then, using this result, the same property is proved for the composite expanded system.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Optimal complementary matrices in systems with overlapping decomposition: a computational approach

© 2006 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.The paper deals with linear quadratic (LQ) optimal control of linear time-invariant (LTI) systems which are decomposed into overlapped subsystems. A mathematical framework (inclusion principle) is available to formalize different structural properties and relations between the initial and the expanded systems, in which the so called complementary matrices play an important role. Up to now, only the structure and conditions on these matrices have been studied in the literature, but not the way to obtain their numerical values systematically. This paper presents a computational approach to select complementary matrices, which can be useful for a practical use of overlapping decompositions. The specific objective is to obtain the complementary matrices such that the quadratic performance for the expanded optimal control problem is minimum. An example is supplied to illustrate the use of the proposed algorithm.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Preservation of controllability-observability in expanded systems

The result contributed by the article is that controllability-observability of an original continuous-time LTI dynamic system can always be simultaneously preserved in expanded systems within the inclusion principle when using block structured complementary matrices. This new structure offers more degrees of freedom for the selection of specific complementary matrices than well known used cases, such as aggregations and restrictions, which enable such preservation only in certain special cases. A complete unrestricted transmission of these qualitative properties from the original controllable-observable system to its expansion is a basic requirement on the expansion/contraction process, mainly when controllers/observers are designed in expanded systems to be consequently contracted for implementation in initially given systems. An original system composed of two overlapped subsystems is adopted as a general prototype ease. A numerical example is suppliedPeer ReviewedPostprint (published version

A design procedure for overlapped guaranteed cost controllers

© 2008 the authors. This work has been accepted to IFAC for publication under a Creative Commons Licence CC-BY-NC-NDIn this paper a quadratic guaranteed cost control problem for a class of linear continuous-time state-delay systems with norm-bounded uncertainties is considered. We will suppose that the systems are composed by two overlapped subsystems but the results can be easily extended to any number of subsystems. The main objective is to design overlapping guaranteed cost controllers with tridiagonal gain matrices for these kind of systems by using a linear matrix inequality (LMI) approach. With this idea in mind, we present a design strategy to reduce the computational burden and to increase the feasibility in the LMI problem. In this context, the use of so-called complementary matrices play an important role. A simple example to illustrate the advantages achieved by using the proposed method is supplied.Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

A decentralized linear quadratic control design method for flexible structures

A decentralized suboptimal linear quadratic control design procedure which combines substructural synthesis, model reduction, decentralized control design, subcontroller synthesis, and controller reduction is proposed for the design of reduced-order controllers for flexible structures. The procedure starts with a definition of the continuum structure to be controlled. An evaluation model of finite dimension is obtained by the finite element method. Then, the finite element model is decomposed into several substructures by using a natural decomposition called substructuring decomposition. Each substructure, at this point, still has too large a dimension and must be reduced to a size that is Riccati-solvable. Model reduction of each substructure can be performed by using any existing model reduction method, e.g., modal truncation, balanced reduction, Krylov model reduction, or mixed-mode method. Then, based on the reduced substructure model, a subcontroller is designed by an LQ optimal control method for each substructure independently. After all subcontrollers are designed, a controller synthesis method called substructural controller synthesis is employed to synthesize all subcontrollers into a global controller. The assembling scheme used is the same as that employed for the structure matrices. Finally, a controller reduction scheme, called the equivalent impulse response energy controller (EIREC) reduction algorithm, is used to reduce the global controller to a reasonable size for implementation. The EIREC reduced controller preserves the impulse response energy of the full-order controller and has the property of matching low-frequency moments and low-frequency power moments. An advantage of the substructural controller synthesis method is that it relieves the computational burden associated with dimensionality. Besides that, the SCS design scheme is also a highly adaptable controller synthesis method for structures with varying configuration, or varying mass and stiffness properties

Decentralized control with information structure constraints

In this paper, some problems related to the design of decentralized controllers are considered. Due to information structure constraints on the systems, we are interested in determine when a gain-matrix corresponding to a control law can be designed having a required structure. To discuss this issue, we consider some generic classes of systems with different control strategies: optimal overlapping control, guaranteed cost control and H∞ control. For each one of them, two scenarios are supposed: state feedback and output feedback controllers. In this line, some new contributions are offered.Postprint (published version

Control of continuous-time LTI systems by means of structurally constrained controllers

This paper deals with the characterization of the fixed modes of multi-channel systems with respect to linear time-invariant (LTI) structurally constrained controllers. Fixed modes can be found numerically for any LTI system with respect to any given control structure, using a random number generator. The existing analytical methods, however, are not capable of characterizing the fixed modes in the most general case of non-strictly proper systems with non-block diagonal (i.e., overlapping) control structure, efficiently. The notion of a decentralized overlapping fixed mode (DOFM) is introduced in this paper to address the above problem in the most general case. To this end, the knowledge of the overlapping control structure is translated into a bipartite graph, whose vertices correspond to the input and output vectors of various control channels. An efficient technique is applied to the obtained graph to identify the DOFMs of the system. It is to be noted that a system is stabilizable via an appropriate LTI decentralized overlapping controller if and only if it does not have any unstable DOFM. Moreover, it is shown how those modes which are not DOFMs can be placed freely in the complex plane using a proper LTI decentralized overlapping controller. The efficacy of this work is demonstrated through an example

Decentralized sliding mode control and estimation for large-scale systems

This thesis concerns the development of an approach of decentralised robust control and estimation for large scale systems (LSSs) using robust sliding mode control (SMC) and sliding mode observers (SMO) theory based on a linear matrix inequality (LMI) approach. A complete theory of decentralized first order sliding mode theory is developed. The main developments proposed in this thesis are: The novel development of an LMI approach to decentralized state feedback SMC. The proposed strategy has good ability in combination with other robust methods to fulfill specific performance and robustness requirements. The development of output based SMC for large scale systems (LSSs). Three types of novel decentralized output feedback SMC methods have been developed using LMI design tools. In contrast to more conventional approaches to SMC design the use of some complicated transformations have been obviated. A decentralized approach to SMO theory has been developed focused on the Walcott-Żak SMO combined with LMI tools. A derivation for bounds applicable to the estimation error for decentralized systems has been given that involves unknown subsystem interactions and modeling uncertainty. Strategies for both actuator and sensor fault estimation using decentralized SMO are discussed.The thesis also provides a case study of the SMC and SMO concepts applied to a non-linear annealing furnace system modelderived from a distributed parameter (partial differential equation) thermal system. The study commences with a lumped system decentralised representation of the furnace derived from the partial differential equations. The SMO and SMC methods derived in the thesis are applied to this lumped parameter furnace model. Results are given demonstrating the validity of the methods proposed and showing a good potential for a valuable practical implementation of fault tolerant control based on furnace temperature sensor faults

Analysis of Hardware Descriptions

The design process for integrated circuits requires a lot of analysis of circuit descriptions. An important class of analyses determines how easy it will be to determine if a physical component suffers from any manufacturing errors. As circuit complexities grow rapidly, the problem of testing circuits also becomes increasingly difficult. This thesis explores the potential for analysing a recent high level hardware description language called Ruby. In particular, we are interested in performing testability analyses of Ruby circuit descriptions. Ruby is ammenable to algebraic manipulation, so we have sought transformations that improve testability while preserving behaviour. The analysis of Ruby descriptions is performed by adapting a technique called abstract interpretation. This has been used successfully to analyse functional programs. This technique is most applicable where the analysis to be captured operates over structures isomorphic to the structure of the circuit. Many digital systems analysis tools require the circuit description to be given in some special form. This can lead to inconsistency between representations, and involves additional work converting between representations. We propose using the original description medium, in this case Ruby, for performing analyses. A related technique, called non-standard interpretation, is shown to be very useful for capturing many circuit analyses. An implementation of a system that performs non-standard interpretation forms the central part of the work. This allows Ruby descriptions to be analysed using alternative interpretations such test pattern generation and circuit layout interpretations. This system follows a similar approach to Boute's system semantics work and O'Donnell's work on Hydra. However, we have allowed a larger class of interpretations to be captured and offer a richer description language. The implementation presented here is constructed to allow a large degree of code sharing between different analyses. Several analyses have been implemented including simulation, test pattern generation and circuit layout. Non-standard interpretation provides a good framework for implementing these analyses. A general model for making non-standard interpretations is presented. Combining forms that combine two interpretations to produce a new interpretation are also introduced. This allows complex circuit analyses to be decomposed in a modular manner into smaller circuit analyses which can be built independently