Q-LEARNING, POLICY ITERATION AND ACTOR-CRITIC REINFORCEMENT LEARNING COMBINED WITH METAHEURISTIC ALGORITHMS IN SERVO SYSTEM CONTROL

This paper carries out the performance analysis of three control system structures and approaches, which combine Reinforcement Learning (RL) and Metaheuristic Algorithms (MAs) as representative optimization algorithms. In the first approach, the Gravitational Search Algorithm (GSA) is employed to initialize the parameters (weights and biases) of the Neural Networks (NNs) involved in Deep Q-Learning by replacing the traditional way of initializing the NNs based on random generated values. In the second approach, the Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) algorithm is employed to train the policy NN in Policy Iteration RL-based control. In the third approach, the GWO algorithm is employed as a critic in an Actor-Critic framework, and used to evaluate the performance of the actor NN. The goal of this paper is to analyze all three RL-based control approaches, aiming to determine which one represents the best fit for solving the proposed control optimization problem. The performance analysis is based on non-parametric statistical tests conducted on the data obtained from real-time experimental results specific to nonlinear servo system position control

Probabilistic investigation of debris impact velocities during extreme flooding events

Forensic engineering surveys of extreme flooding events, such as the 2011 Tohoku Tsunami and the 2012 Hurricane Katrina, demonstrated the importance of debris in estimating loading on structures. Debris are any solid objects entrained within the inundating flow. The resulting loads from these objects can be the result of debris damming, where debris accumulate at the front face of a structure, or of individual debris impact, where the debris exerts an impulse load as the it rapidly impacts the structure

A Unified Anti-Windup Technique for Fuzzy and Sliding Mode Controllers

This paper proposes the unified treatment of an anti-windup technique for fuzzy and sliding mode controllers. A back-calculation and tracking anti-windup scheme is proposed in order to prevent the zero error integrator wind-up in the structures of state feedback fuzzy controllers and sliding mode controllers. The state feedback sliding mode controllers are based on the state feedback-based computation of the switching variable. An example that copes with the position control of an electro-hydraulic servo-system is presented. The conclusions are pointed out on the basis of digital simulation results for the state feedback fuzzy controller

Data-Driven Model-Free Sliding Mode and Fuzzy Control with Experimental Validation

The paper presents the combination of the model-free control technique with two popular nonlinear control techniques, sliding mode control and fuzzy control. Two data-driven model-free sliding mode control structures and one data-driven model-free fuzzy control structure are given. The data-driven model-free sliding mode control structures are built upon a model-free intelligent Proportional-Integral (iPI) control system structure, where an augmented control signal is inserted in the iPI control law to deal with the error dynamics in terms of sliding mode control. The data-driven model-free fuzzy control structure is developed by fuzzifying the PI component of the continuous-time iPI control law. The design approaches of the data-driven model-free control algorithms are offered. The data-driven model-free control algorithms are validated as controllers by real-time experiments conducted on 3D crane system laboratory equipment

Grey Wolf Optimizer-Based Approaches to Path Planning and Fuzzy Logic-based Tracking Control for Mobile Robots

This paper proposes two applications of Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO) algorithms to a path planning (PaPl) problem and a Proportional-Integral (PI)-fuzzy controller tuning problem. Both optimization problems solved by GWO algorithms are explained in detail. An off-line GWO-based PaPl approach for Nonholonomic Wheeled Mobile Robots (NWMRs) in static environments is proposed. Once the PaPl problem is solved resulting in the reference trajectory of the robots, the paper also suggests a GWO-based approach to tune cost-effective PI-fuzzy controllers in tracking control problem for NWMRs. The experimental results are demonstrated through simple multiagent settings conducted on the nRobotic platform developed at the Politehnica University of Timisoara, Romania, and they prove both the effectiveness of the two GWO-based approaches and major performance improvement

A LOW-COST APPROACH TO DATA-DRIVEN FUZZY CONTROL OF SERVO SYSTEMS

Servo systems become more and more important in control systems applications in various fields as both separate control systems and actuators. Ensuring very good control system performance using few information on the servo system model (viewed as a controlled process) is a challenging task. Starting with authors’ results on data-driven model-free control, fuzzy control and the indirect model-free tuning of fuzzy controllers, this paper suggests a low-cost approach to the data-driven fuzzy control of servo systems. The data-driven fuzzy control approach consists of six steps: (i) open-loop data-driven system identification to produce the process model from input-output data expressed as the system step response, (ii) Proportional-Integral (PI) controller tuning using the Extended Symmetrical Optimum (ESO) method, (iii) PI controller parameters mapping onto parameters of Takagi-Sugeno PI-fuzzy controller in terms of the modal equivalence principle, (iv) closed-loop data-driven system identification, (v) PI controller tuning using the ESO method, (vi) PI controller parameters mapping onto parameters of Takagi-Sugeno PI-fuzzy controller. The steps (iv), (v) and (vi) are optional. The approach is applied to the position control of a nonlinear servo system. The experimental results obtained on laboratory equipment validate the approach