Robust nonlinear control of vectored thrust aircraft

An interdisciplinary program in robust control for nonlinear systems with applications to a variety of engineering problems is outlined. Major emphasis will be placed on flight control, with both experimental and analytical studies. This program builds on recent new results in control theory for stability, stabilization, robust stability, robust performance, synthesis, and model reduction in a unified framework using Linear Fractional Transformations (LFT's), Linear Matrix Inequalities (LMI's), and the structured singular value micron. Most of these new advances have been accomplished by the Caltech controls group independently or in collaboration with researchers in other institutions. These recent results offer a new and remarkably unified framework for all aspects of robust control, but what is particularly important for this program is that they also have important implications for system identification and control of nonlinear systems. This combines well with Caltech's expertise in nonlinear control theory, both in geometric methods and methods for systems with constraints and saturations

Fuzzy control turns 50: 10 years later

In 2015, we celebrate the 50th anniversary of Fuzzy Sets, ten years after the main milestones regarding its applications in fuzzy control in their 40th birthday were reviewed in FSS, see [1]. Ten years is at the same time a long period and short time thinking to the inner dynamics of research. This paper, presented for these 50 years of Fuzzy Sets is taking into account both thoughts. A first part presents a quick recap of the history of fuzzy control: from model-free design, based on human reasoning to quasi-LPV (Linear Parameter Varying) model-based control design via some milestones, and key applications. The second part shows where we arrived and what the improvements are since the milestone of the first 40 years. A last part is devoted to discussion and possible future research topics.Guerra, T.; Sala, A.; Tanaka, K. (2015). Fuzzy control turns 50: 10 years later. Fuzzy Sets and Systems. 281:162-182. doi:10.1016/j.fss.2015.05.005S16218228

A review of convex approaches for control, observation and safety of linear parameter varying and Takagi-Sugeno systems

This paper provides a review about the concept of convex systems based on Takagi-Sugeno, linear parameter varying (LPV) and quasi-LPV modeling. These paradigms are capable of hiding the nonlinearities by means of an equivalent description which uses a set of linear models interpolated by appropriately defined weighing functions. Convex systems have become very popular since they allow applying extended linear techniques based on linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) to complex nonlinear systems. This survey aims at providing the reader with a significant overview of the existing LMI-based techniques for convex systems in the fields of control, observation and safety. Firstly, a detailed review of stability, feedback, tracking and model predictive control (MPC) convex controllers is considered. Secondly, the problem of state estimation is addressed through the design of proportional, proportional-integral, unknown input and descriptor observers. Finally, safety of convex systems is discussed by describing popular techniques for fault diagnosis and fault tolerant control (FTC).Peer ReviewedPostprint (published version

Linear matrix inequality-based nonlinear adaptive robust control with application to unmanned aircraft systems

Unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) are gaining popularity in civil and commercial applications as their lightweight on-board computers become more powerful and affordable, their power storage devices improve, and the Federal Aviation Administration addresses the legal and safety concerns of integrating UASs in the national airspace. Consequently, many researchers are pursuing novel methods to control UASs in order to improve their capabilities, dependability, and safety assurance. The nonlinear control approach is a common choice as it offers several benefits for these highly nonlinear aerospace systems (e.g., the quadrotor). First, the controller design is physically intuitive and is derived from well known dynamic equations. Second, the final control law is valid in a larger region of operation, including far from the equilibrium states. And third, the procedure is largely methodical, requiring less expertise with gain tuning, which can be arduous for a novice engineer. ^ Considering these facts, this thesis proposes a nonlinear controller design method that combines the advantages of adaptive robust control (ARC) with the powerful design tools of linear matrix inequalities (LMI). The ARC-LMI controller is designed with a discontinuous projection-based adaptation law, and guarantees a prescribed transient and steady state tracking performance for uncertain systems in the presence of matched disturbances. The norm of the tracking error is bounded by a known function that depends on the controller design parameters in a known form. Furthermore, the LMI-based part of the controller ensures the stability of the system while overcoming polytopic uncertainties, and minimizes the control effort. This can reduce the number of parameters that require adaptation, and helps to avoid control input saturation. ^ These desirable characteristics make the ARC-LMI control algorithm well suited for the quadrotor UAS, which may have unknown parameters and may encounter external disturbances such as wind gusts and turbulence. This thesis develops the ARC-LMI attitude and position controllers for an X-configuration quadrotor helicopter. The inner-loop of the autopilot controls the attitude and altitude of the quadrotor, and the outer-loop controls its position in the earth-fixed coordinate frame. Furthermore, by intelligently generating a smooth trajectory from the given reference coordinates (waypoints), the transient performance is improved. The simulation results indicate that the ARC-LMI controller design is useful for a variety of quadrotor applications, including precise trajectory tracking, autonomous waypoint navigation in the presence of disturbances, and package delivery without loss of performanc

Robust controller design for input-delayed systems using predictive feedback and an uncertainty estimator

[EN] This paper deals with the problem of stabilizing a class of input-delayed systems with (possibly) nonlinear uncertainties by using explicit delay compensation. It is well known that plain predictive schemes lack robustness with respect to uncertain model parameters. In this work, an uncertainty estimator is derived for input-delay systems and combined with a modified state predictor, which uses current available information of the estimated uncertainties. Furthermore, based on Lyapunov-Krasovskii functionals, a computable criterion to check robust stability of the closed-loop is developed and cast into a minimization problem constrained to an LMI. Additionally, for a given input delay, an iterative-LMI algorithm is proposed to design stabilizing tuning parameters. The main results are illustrated and validated using a numerical example with a second-order dynamic system.This work was partially supported by projects PROMETEOII/2013/004, Conselleria d Educació, Generalitat Valenciana, and TIN2014-56158-C4-4-P-AR, Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, Spain.Sanz Diaz, R.; García Gil, PJ.; Albertos Pérez, P.; Zhong, Q. (2017). Robust controller design for input-delayed systems using predictive feedback and an uncertainty estimator. International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control. 27(10):1826-1840. https://doi.org/10.1002/rnc.3639S182618402710Stability and Stabilization of Systems with Time Delay. (2011). IEEE Control Systems, 31(1), 38-65. doi:10.1109/mcs.2010.939135Normey-Rico, J. E., Bordons, C., & Camacho, E. F. (1997). Improving the robustness of dead-time compensating PI controllers. Control Engineering Practice, 5(6), 801-810. doi:10.1016/s0967-0661(97)00064-6Michiels, W., & Niculescu, S.-I. (2003). On the delay sensitivity of Smith Predictors. International Journal of Systems Science, 34(8-9), 543-551. doi:10.1080/00207720310001609057Normey-Rico, J. E., & Camacho, E. F. (2008). Dead-time compensators: A survey. Control Engineering Practice, 16(4), 407-428. doi:10.1016/j.conengprac.2007.05.006Guzmán, J. L., García, P., Hägglund, T., Dormido, S., Albertos, P., & Berenguel, M. (2008). Interactive tool for analysis of time-delay systems with dead-time compensators. Control Engineering Practice, 16(7), 824-835. doi:10.1016/j.conengprac.2007.09.002Manitius, A., & Olbrot, A. (1979). Finite spectrum assignment problem for systems with delays. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 24(4), 541-552. doi:10.1109/tac.1979.1102124Artstein, Z. (1982). Linear systems with delayed controls: A reduction. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 27(4), 869-879. doi:10.1109/tac.1982.1103023Moon, Y. S., Park, P., & Kwon, W. H. (2001). Robust stabilization of uncertain input-delayed systems using reduction method. Automatica, 37(2), 307-312. doi:10.1016/s0005-1098(00)00145-xYue, D. (2004). Robust stabilization of uncertain systems with unknown input delay. Automatica, 40(2), 331-336. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2003.10.005Yue, D., & Han, Q.-L. (2005). Delayed feedback control of uncertain systems with time-varying input delay. Automatica, 41(2), 233-240. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2004.09.006Lozano, R., Castillo, P., Garcia, P., & Dzul, A. (2004). Robust prediction-based control for unstable delay systems: Application to the yaw control of a mini-helicopter. Automatica, 40(4), 603-612. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2003.10.007Gonzalez, A., Garcia, P., Albertos, P., Castillo, P., & Lozano, R. (2012). Robustness of a discrete-time predictor-based controller for time-varying measurement delay. Control Engineering Practice, 20(2), 102-110. doi:10.1016/j.conengprac.2011.09.001Karafyllis, I., & Krstic, M. (2013). Robust predictor feedback for discrete-time systems with input delays. International Journal of Control, 86(9), 1652-1663. doi:10.1080/00207179.2013.792005Krstic, M. (2010). Input Delay Compensation for Forward Complete and Strict-Feedforward Nonlinear Systems. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 55(2), 287-303. doi:10.1109/tac.2009.2034923Bekiaris-Liberis, N., & Krstic, M. (2011). Compensation of Time-Varying Input and State Delays for Nonlinear Systems. Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control, 134(1). doi:10.1115/1.4005278Karafyllis, I., Malisoff, M., Mazenc, F., & Pepe, P. (Eds.). (2016). Recent Results on Nonlinear Delay Control Systems. Advances in Delays and Dynamics. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-18072-4Cacace, F., Conte, F., Germani, A., & Pepe, P. (2016). Stabilization of strict-feedback nonlinear systems with input delay using closed-loop predictors. International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control, 26(16), 3524-3540. doi:10.1002/rnc.3517Fridman, E., & Shaked, U. (2002). An improved stabilization method for linear time-delay systems. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 47(11), 1931-1937. doi:10.1109/tac.2002.804462Fridman, E., & Shaked, U. (2002). A descriptor system approach to H/sub ∞/ control of linear time-delay systems. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 47(2), 253-270. doi:10.1109/9.983353Chen, W.-H., & Zheng, W. X. (2006). On improved robust stabilization of uncertain systems with unknown input delay. Automatica, 42(6), 1067-1072. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2006.02.015Krstic, M. (2008). Lyapunov tools for predictor feedbacks for delay systems: Inverse optimality and robustness to delay mismatch. Automatica, 44(11), 2930-2935. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2008.04.010Léchappé, V., Moulay, E., Plestan, F., Glumineau, A., & Chriette, A. (2015). New predictive scheme for the control of LTI systems with input delay and unknown disturbances. Automatica, 52, 179-184. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2014.11.003Roh, Y.-H., & Oh, J.-H. (1999). Robust stabilization of uncertain input-delay systems by sliding mode control with delay compensation. Automatica, 35(11), 1861-1865. doi:10.1016/s0005-1098(99)00106-5Bresch-Pietri, D., & Krstic, M. (2009). Adaptive trajectory tracking despite unknown input delay and plant parameters. Automatica, 45(9), 2074-2081. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2009.04.027Kamalapurkar, R., Fischer, N., Obuz, S., & Dixon, W. E. (2016). Time-Varying Input and State Delay Compensation for Uncertain Nonlinear Systems. IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, 61(3), 834-839. doi:10.1109/tac.2015.2451472Chen, W.-H., Ohnishi, K., & Guo, L. (2015). Advances in Disturbance/Uncertainty Estimation and Attenuation [Guest editors’ introduction]. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, 62(9), 5758-5762. doi:10.1109/tie.2015.2453347Chen, W.-H., Yang, J., Guo, L., & Li, S. (2016). Disturbance-Observer-Based Control and Related Methods—An Overview. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, 63(2), 1083-1095. doi:10.1109/tie.2015.2478397Sariyildiz E Ohnishi K Design constraints of disturbance observer in the presence of time delay 2013 IEEE International Conference on Mechatronics (ICM) Vicenza, Italy 2013 69 74Wang, Q.-G., Hang, C. C., & Yang, X.-P. (2001). Single-loop controller design via IMC principles. Automatica, 37(12), 2041-2048. doi:10.1016/s0005-1098(01)00170-4Zheng, Q., & Gao, Z. (2014). Predictive active disturbance rejection control for processes with time delay. ISA Transactions, 53(4), 873-881. doi:10.1016/j.isatra.2013.09.021Chen, M., & Chen, W.-H. (2010). Disturbance-observer-based robust control for time delay uncertain systems. International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems, 8(2), 445-453. doi:10.1007/s12555-010-0233-5Guo, L., & Chen, W.-H. (2005). Disturbance attenuation and rejection for systems with nonlinearity via DOBC approach. International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control, 15(3), 109-125. doi:10.1002/rnc.978Zhong, Q.-C., & Rees, D. (2004). Control of Uncertain LTI Systems Based on an Uncertainty and Disturbance Estimator. Journal of Dynamic Systems, Measurement, and Control, 126(4), 905-910. doi:10.1115/1.1850529Yong He, Min Wu, & Jin-Hua She. (2005). Improved bounded-real-lemma representation and H/sub /spl infin// control of systems with polytopic uncertainties. IEEE Transactions on Circuits and Systems II: Express Briefs, 52(7), 380-383. doi:10.1109/tcsii.2005.850418CAO, Y.-Y., LAM, J., & SUN, Y.-X. (1998). Static Output Feedback Stabilization: An ILMI Approach. Automatica, 34(12), 1641-1645. doi:10.1016/s0005-1098(98)80021-6Marler, R. T., & Arora, J. S. (2009). 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This paper proposes a gain-scheduling control design strategy for a class of linear systems with the presence of both input saturation constraints and norm-bounded parametric uncertainty. LMI conditions are derived in order to obtain a gain-scheduled controller that ensures the robust stability and performance of the closed loop system. The main steps to obtain such a controller are given. Differently from other gain-scheduled approaches in the literature, this one focuses on the problem of H∞ loop shaping control design with input saturation nonlinearity and norm-bounded uncertainty to reduce the effect of the disturbance input on the controlled outputs. Here, the design problem has been formulated in the four-block H∞ synthesis framework, in which it is possible to describe the parametric uncertainty and the input saturation nonlinearity as perturbations to normalized coprime factors of the shaped plant. As a result, the shaped plant is represented as a linear parameter-varying (LPV) system while the norm-bounded uncertainty and input saturation are incorporated. This procedure yields a linear parameter-varying structure for the controller that ensures the stability of the polytopic LPV shaped plant from the vertex property. Finally, the effectiveness of the method is illustrated through application to a physical system: a VTOL “vertical taking-off landing” helicopter

Robust model-based fault estimation and fault-tolerant control : towards an integration

To maintain robustly acceptable system performance, fault estimation (FE) is adopted to reconstruct fault signals and a fault-tolerant control (FTC) controller is employed to compensate for the fault effects. The inevitably existing system and estimation uncertainties result in the so-called bi-directional robustness interactions defined in this work between the FE and FTC functions, which gives rise to an important and challenging yet open integrated FE/FTC design problem concerned in this thesis. An example of fault-tolerant wind turbine pitch control is provided as a practical motivation for integrated FE/FTC design.To achieve the integrated FE/FTC design for linear systems, two strategies are proposed. A H∞ optimization based approach is first proposed for linear systems with differentiable matched faults, using augmented state unknown input observer FE and adaptive sliding mode FTC. The integrated design is converted into an observer-based robust control problem solved via a single-step linear matrix inequality formulation.With the purpose of an integrated design with more freedom and also applicable for a range of general fault scenarios, a decoupling approach is further proposed. This approach can estimate and compensate unmatched non-differentiable faults and perturbations by combined adaptive sliding mode augmented state unknown input observer and backstepping FTC controller. The observer structure renders a recovery of the Separation Principle and allows great freedom for the FE/FTC designs.Integrated FE/FTC design strategies are also developed for Takagi-Sugeno fuzzy modelling nonlinear systems, Lipschitz nonlinear systems, and large-scale interconnected systems, based on extensions of the H∞ optimization approach for linear systems.Tutorial examples are used to illustrate the design strategies for each approach. Physical systems, a 3-DOF (degree-of-freedom) helicopter and a 3-machine power system, are used to provide further evaluation of the proposed integrated FE/FTC strategies. Future research on this subject is also outlined

Development of U-model enhansed nonlinear systems

Nonlinear control system design has been widely recognised as a challenging issue where the key objective is to develop a general model prototype with conciseness, flexibility and manipulability, so that the designed control system can best match the required performance or specifications. As a generic systematic approach, U-model concept appeared in Prof. Quanmin Zhu’s Doctoral thesis, and U-model approach was firstly published in the journal paper titled with ‘U-model based pole placement for nonlinear plants’ in 2002.The U-model polynomial prototype precisely describes a wide range of smooth nonlinear polynomial models, defined as a controller output u(t-1) based time-varying polynomial models converted from the original nonlinear model. Within this equivalent U-model expression, the first study of U-model based pole placement controller design for nonlinear plants is a simple mapping exercise from ordinary linear and nonlinear difference equations to time-varying polynomials in terms of the plant input u(t-1). The U-model framework realised the concise and applicable design for nonlinear control system by using such linear polynomial control system design approaches.Since the first publication, the U-model methodology has progressed and evolved over the course of a decade. By using the U-model technique, researchers have proposed many different linear algorithms for the design of control systems for the nonlinear polynomial model including; adaptive control, internal control, sliding mode control, predictive control and neural network control. However, limited research has been concerned with the design and analysis of robust stability and performance of U-model based control systems.This project firstly proposes a suitable method to analyse the robust stability of the developed U-model based pole placement control systems against uncertainty. The parameter variation is bounded, thus the robust stability margin of the closed loop system can be determined by using LMI (Linear Matrix Inequality) based robust stability analysis procedure. U-block model is defined as an input output linear closed loop model with pole assignor converted from the U-model based control system. With the bridge of U-model approach, it connects the linear state space design approach with the nonlinear polynomial model. Therefore, LMI based linear robust controller design approaches are able to design enhanced robust control system within the U-block model structure.With such development, the first stage U-model methodology provides concise and flexible solutions for complex problems, where linear controller design methodologies are directly applied to nonlinear polynomial plant-based control system design. The next milestone work expands the U-model technique into state space control systems to establish the new framework, defined as the U-state space model, providing a generic prototype for the simplification of nonlinear state space design approaches.The U-state space model is first described as a controller output u(t-1) based time-varying state equations, which is equivalent to the original linear/nonlinear state space models after conversion. Then, a basic idea of corresponding U-state feedback control system design method is proposed based on the U-model principle. The linear state space feedback control design approach is employed to nonlinear plants described in state space realisation under U-state space structure. The desired state vectors defined as xd(t), are determined by closed loop performance (such as pole placement) or designer specifications (such as LQR). Then the desired state vectors substitute the desired state vectors into original state space equations (regarded as next time state variable xd(t) = x(t) ). Therefore, the controller output u(t-1) can be obtained from one of the roots of a root-solving iterative algorithm.A quad-rotor rotorcraft dynamic model and inverted pendulum system are introduced to verify the U-state space control system design approach for MIMO/SIMO system. The linear design approach is used to determine the closed loop state equation, then the controller output can be obtained from root solver. Numerical examples and case studies are employed in this study to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methods

Optimized state feedback regulation of 3DOF helicopter system via extremum seeking

In this paper, an optimized state feedback regulation of a 3 degree of freedom (DOF) helicopter is designed via extremum seeking (ES) technique. Multi-parameter ES is applied to optimize the tracking performance via tuning State Vector Feedback with Integration of the Control Error (SVFBICE). Discrete multivariable version of ES is developed to minimize a cost function that measures the performance of the controller. The cost function is a function of the error between the actual and desired axis positions. The controller parameters are updated online as the optimization takes place. This method significantly decreases the time in obtaining optimal controller parameters. Simulations were conducted for the online optimization under both fixed and varying operating conditions. The results demonstrate the usefulness of using ES for preserving the maximum attainable performance

Integrated fault-tolerant control for a 3-DOF helicopter with actuator faults and saturation

© The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2017. This study proposes a fault estimation (FE)-based fault-tolerant control (FTC) strategy to maintain system reliability and achieve desirable control performance for a 3-DOF helicopter system with both actuator drift and oscillation faults and saturation. The effects of the faults and saturation are combined into a composite non-differentiable actuator fault function, which is approximated by a differentiable function and estimated together with the system state using a non-linear unknown input observer. An adaptive sliding mode controller based on the estimates is developed to compensate the effects of the faults and saturation. Taking into account the bi-directional robustness interactions between the FE and FTC functions, an integrated design approach is proposed to obtain the observer and controller gains in a single step, so as to achieve robust overall FTC system performance. In fault-free cases, the proposed strategy can be considered as a new approach for anti-windup control to compensate the effect of input saturation. Comparative simulations are provided to verify the effectiveness of the proposed design under different actuator fault scenarios