Dynamic Actuator Selection and Robust State-Feedback Control of Networked Soft Actuators

The design of robots that are light, soft, powerful is a grand challenge. Since they can easily adapt to dynamic environments, soft robotic systems have the potential of changing the status-quo of bulky robotics. A crucial component of soft robotics is a soft actuator that is activated by external stimuli to generate desired motions. Unfortunately, there is a lack of powerful soft actuators that operate through lightweight power sources. To that end, we recently designed a highly scalable, flexible, biocompatible Electromagnetic Soft Actuator (ESA). With ESAs, artificial muscles can be designed by integrating a network of ESAs. The main research gap addressed in this work is in the absence of system-theoretic understanding of the impact of the realtime control and actuator selection algorithms on the performance of networked soft-body actuators and ESAs. The objective of this paper is to establish a framework that guides the analysis and robust control of networked ESAs. A novel ESA is described, and a configuration of soft actuator matrix to resemble artificial muscle fiber is presented. A mathematical model which depicts the physical network is derived, considering the disturbances due to external forces and linearization errors as an integral part of this model. Then, a robust control and minimal actuator selection problem with logistic constraints and control input bounds is formulated, and tractable computational routines are proposed with numerical case studies.Comment: To appear at the 2018 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Brisbane, Australia, May 21, 2018--May 25, 201

Output Controllability of a Linear Dynamical System with Sparse Controls

In this paper, we study the conditions to be satisfied by a discrete-time linear system to ensure output controllability using sparse control inputs. A set of necessary and sufficient conditions can be directly obtained by extending the Kalman rank test for output controllability. However, the verification of these conditions is computationally heavy due to their combinatorial nature. Therefore, we derive non-combinatorial conditions for output sparse controllability which can be verified with polynomial time complexity. Our results also provide bounds on the minimum sparsity level required to ensure output controllability of the system. This additional insight is useful for designing sparse control input that drives the system to any desired output.Comment: 10 pages, no figure

Controllability of a Linear System with Nonnegative Sparse Controls

This paper studies controllability of a discrete-time linear dynamical system using nonnegative and sparse inputs. These constraints on the control input arise naturally in many real-life systems where the external influence on the system is unidirectional, and activating each input node adds to the cost of control. We derive the necessary and sufficient conditions for controllability of the system, without imposing any constraints on the system matrices. Unlike the well-known Kalman rank based controllability criteria, the conditions presented in this paper can be verified in polynomial time, and the verification complexity is independent of the sparsity level. The proof of the result is based on the analytical tools concerning the properties of a convex cone. Our results also provide a closed-form expression for the minimum number of control nodes to be activated at every time instant to ensure controllability of the system using positive controls.Comment: 6 pages, no figure

Controllability of Linear Dynamical Systems Under Input Sparsity Constraints

In this work, we consider the controllability of a discrete-time linear dynamical system with sparse control inputs. Sparsity constraints on the input arises naturally in networked systems, where activating each input variable adds to the cost of control. We derive algebraic necessary and sufficient conditions for ensuring controllability of a system with an arbitrary transfer matrix. The derived conditions can be verified in polynomial time complexity, unlike the more traditional Kalman-type rank tests. Further, we characterize the minimum number of input vectors required to satisfy the derived conditions for controllability. Finally, we present a generalized Kalman decomposition-like procedure that separates the state-space into subspaces corresponding to sparse-controllable and sparse-uncontrollable parts. These results form a theoretical basis for designing networked linear control systems with sparse inputs.Comment: 11 page

Data-Driven Selection of Actuators for Optimal Control of Airfoil Separation

We present a systematic approach for determining the optimal actuator location for separation control from input-output response data, gathered from numerical simulations or physical experiments. The Eigensystem Realization Algorithm is used to extract state-space descriptions from the response data associated with a candidate set of actuator locations. These system realizations are then used to determine the actuator location among the set that can drive the system output to an arbitrary value with minimal control effort. The solution of the corresponding minimum energy optimal control problem is evaluated by computing the generalized output controllability Gramian. We use the method to analyze high-fidelity numerical simulation data of the lift and separation-angle responses to a pulse of localized body-force actuation from six distinct locations on the upper surface of a NACA 65(1)-412 airfoil. We find that the optimal location for controlling lift is different from the optimal location for controlling separation angle. In order to explain the physical mechanisms underlying these differences, we conduct controllability analyses of the flowfield by leveraging the dynamic mode decomposition with control algorithm. These modal analyses of flowfield response data reveal that excitation of coherent structures in the wake benefit lift control; whereas, excitation of coherent structures in the shear layer benefit separation-angle control

Simultaneous Sensor and Actuator Selection/Placement through Output Feedback Control

In most dynamic networks, it is impractical to measure all of the system states; instead, only a subset of the states are measured through sensors. Consequently, and unlike full state feedback controllers, output feedback control utilizes only the measured states to obtain a stable closed-loop performance. This paper explores the interplay between the selection of minimal number of sensors and actuators (SaA) that yield a stable closed-loop system performance. Through the formulation of the static output feedback control problem, we show that the simultaneous selection of minimal set of SaA is a combinatorial optimization problem with mixed-integer nonlinear matrix inequality constraints. To address the computational complexity, we develop two approaches: The first approach relies on integer/disjunctive programming principles, while the second approach is a simple algorithm that is akin to binary search routines. The optimality of the two approaches is also discussed. Numerical experiments are included showing the performance of the developed approaches.Comment: 6 page

Sensor Placement Strategies for Some Classes of Nonlinear Dynamic Systems via Lyapunov Theory

In this paper, the problem of placing sensors for some classes of nonlinear dynamic systems (NDS) is investigated. In conjunction with mixed-integer programming, classical Lyapunov-based arguments are used to find the minimal sensor configuration such that the NDS internal states can be observed while still optimizing some estimation metrics. The paper's approach is based on two phases. The first phase assumes that the encompassed nonlinearities belong to one of the following function set classifications: bounded Jacobian, Lipschitz continuous, one-sided Lipschitz, or quadratically inner-bounded. To parameterize these classifications, two approaches based on stochastic point-based and interval-based optimization methods are explored. Given the parameterization, the second phase formulates the sensor placement problem for various NDS classes through mixed-integer convex programming. The theoretical optimality of the sensor placement alongside a state estimator design are then given. Numerical tests on traffic network models showcase that the proposed approach yields sensor placements that are consistent with conventional wisdom in traffic theory.Comment: Presented in the 58th Conference on Decision and Control - Nice, France - December 11th-13th 201

Time-Varying Sensor and Actuator Selection for Uncertain Cyber-Physical Systems

We propose methods to solve time-varying, sensor and actuator (SaA) selection problems for uncertain cyber-physical systems. We show that many SaA selection problems for optimizing a variety of control and estimation metrics can be posed as semidefinite optimization problems with mixed-integer bilinear matrix inequalities (MIBMIs). Although this class of optimization problems are computationally challenging, we present tractable approaches that directly tackle MIBMIs, providing both upper and lower bounds, and that lead to effective heuristics for SaA selection. The upper and lower bounds are obtained via successive convex approximations and semidefinite programming relaxations, respectively, and selections are obtained with a novel slicing algorithm from the solutions of the bounding problems. Custom branch-and-bound and combinatorial greedy approaches are also developed for a broad class of systems for comparison. Finally, comprehensive numerical experiments are performed to compare the different methods and illustrate their effectiveness

On A Relaxation of Time-Varying Actuator Placement

We consider the time-varying actuator placement in continuous time, where the goal is to maximize the trace of the controllability Grammian. A natural relaxation of the problem is to allow the binary $\{0,1\}$ variable indicating whether an actuator is used at a given time to take on values in the closed interval $[0,1]$. We show that all optimal solutions of both the original and the relaxed problems can be given via an explicit formula, and that, as long as the input matrix has no zero columns, the solutions sets of the original and relaxed problem coincide

Deterministic and Randomized Actuator Scheduling With Guaranteed Performance Bounds

In this paper, we investigate the problem of actuator selection for linear dynamical systems. We develop a framework to design a sparse actuator schedule for a given large-scale linear system with guaranteed performance bounds using deterministic polynomial-time and randomized approximately linear-time algorithms. First, we introduce systemic controllability metrics for linear dynamical systems that are monotone and homogeneous with respect to the controllability Gramian. We show that several popular and widely used optimization criteria in the literature belong to this class of controllability metrics. Our main result is to provide a polynomial-time actuator schedule that on average selects only a constant number of actuators at each time step, independent of the dimension, to furnish a guaranteed approximation of the controllability metrics in comparison to when all actuators are in use. Our results naturally apply to the dual problem of sensor selection, in which we provide a guaranteed approximation to the observability Gramian. We illustrate the effectiveness of our theoretical findings via several numerical simulations using benchmark examples