Time-Optimal Trajectories of Generic Control-Affine Systems Have at Worst Iterated Fuller Singularities

We consider in this paper the regularity problem for time-optimal trajectories of a single-input control-affine system on a n-dimensional manifold. We prove that, under generic conditions on the drift and the controlled vector field, any control u associated with an optimal trajectory is smooth out of a countable set of times. More precisely, there exists an integer K, only depending on the dimension n, such that the non-smoothness set of u is made of isolated points, accumulations of isolated points, and so on up to K-th order iterated accumulations

Converse Lyapunov Theorems for Switched Systems in Banach and Hilbert Spaces

We consider switched systems on Banach and Hilbert spaces governed by strongly continuous one-parameter semigroups of linear evolution operators. We provide necessary and sufficient conditions for their global exponential stability, uniform with respect to the switching signal, in terms of the existence of a Lyapunov function common to all modes

Pliability, or the whitney extension theorem for curves in carnot groups

The Whitney extension theorem is a classical result in analysis giving a necessary and sufficient condition for a function defined on a closed set to be extendable to the whole space with a given class of regularity. It has been adapted to several settings, among which the one of Carnot groups. However, the target space has generally been assumed to be equal to R^d for some d $\ge$ 1. We focus here on the extendability problem for general ordered pairs (G\_1,G\_2) (with G\_2 non-Abelian). We analyze in particular the case G\_1 = R and characterize the groups G\_2 for which the Whitney extension property holds, in terms of a newly introduced notion that we call pliability. Pliability happens to be related to rigidity as defined by Bryant an Hsu. We exploit this relation in order to provide examples of non-pliable Carnot groups, that is, Carnot groups so that the Whitney extension property does not hold. We use geometric control theory results on the accessibility of control affine systems in order to test the pliability of a Carnot group. In particular, we recover some recent results by Le Donne, Speight and Zimmermann about Lusin approximation in Carnot groups of step 2 and Whitney extension in Heisenberg groups. We extend such results to all pliable Carnot groups, and we show that the latter may be of arbitrarily large step

On the stabilization of persistently excited linear systems

We consider control systems of the type $\dot x = A x +\alpha(t)bu$, where $u\in\R$, $(A,b)$ is a controllable pair and $\alpha$ is an unknown time-varying signal with values in $[0,1]$ satisfying a persistent excitation condition i.e., \int_t^{t+T}\al(s)ds\geq \mu for every $t\geq 0$, with $0<\mu\leq T$ independent on $t$. We prove that such a system is stabilizable with a linear feedback depending only on the pair $(T,\mu)$ if the eigenvalues of $A$ have non-positive real part. We also show that stabilizability does not hold for arbitrary matrices $A$. Moreover, the question of whether the system can be stabilized or not with an arbitrarily large rate of convergence gives rise to a bifurcation phenomenon in dependence of the parameter $\mu/T$

New high order sufficient conditions for configuration tracking

In this paper, we propose new conditions guaranteeing that the trajectories of a mechanical control system can track any curve on the configuration manifold. We focus on systems that can be represented as forced affine connection control systems and we generalize the sufficient conditions for tracking known in the literature. The new results are proved by a combination of averaging procedures by highly oscillating controls with the notion of kinematic reduction.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:0911.536

Growth rates for persistently excited linear systems

We consider a family of linear control systems $\dot{x}=Ax+\alpha Bu$ where $\alpha$ belongs to a given class of persistently exciting signals. We seek maximal $\alpha$-uniform stabilisation and destabilisation by means of linear feedbacks $u=Kx$. We extend previous results obtained for bidimensional single-input linear control systems to the general case as follows: if the pair $(A,B)$ verifies a certain Lie bracket generating condition, then the maximal rate of convergence of $(A,B)$ is equal to the maximal rate of divergence of $(-A,-B)$. We also provide more precise results in the general single-input case, where the above result is obtained under the sole assumption of controllability of the pair $(A,B)$