Periodically Controlled Hybrid Systems: Verifying A Controller for An Autonomous Vehicle

This paper introduces Periodically Controlled Hybrid Automata (PCHA) for describing a class of hybrid control systems. In a PCHA, control actions occur roughly periodically while internal and input actions, may occur in the interim changing the discrete-state or the setpoint. Based on periodicity and subtangential conditions, a new sufficient condition for verifying invariance of PCHAs is presented. This technique is used in verifying safety of the planner-controller subsystem of an autonomous ground vehicle, and in deriving geometric properties of planner generated paths that can be followed safely by the controller under environmental uncertainties

Influence of anisotropic ion shape, asymmetric valency, and electrolyte concentration on structural and thermodynamic properties of an electric double layer

Grand canonical Monte Carlo simulation results are reported for an electric double layer modelled by a planar charged hard wall, anisotropic shape cations, and spherical anions at different electrolyte concentrations and asymmetric valencies. The cations consist of two tangentially tethered hard spheres of the same diameter, $d$. One sphere is charged while the other is neutral. Spherical anions are charged hard spheres of diameter $d$. The ion valency asymmetry 1:2 and 2:1 is considered, with the ions being immersed in a solvent mimicked by a continuum dielectric medium at standard temperature. The simulations are carried out for the following electrolyte concentrations: 0.1, 1.0 and 2.0 M. Profiles of the electrode-ion, electrode-neutral sphere singlet distributions, the average orientation of dimers, and the mean electrostatic potential are calculated for a given electrode surface charge, $\sigma$, while the contact electrode potential and the differential capacitance are presented for varying electrode charge. With an increasing electrolyte concentration, the shape of differential capacitance curve changes from that with a minimum surrounded by maxima into that of a distorted single maximum. For a 2:1 electrolyte, the maximum is located at a small negative $\sigma$ value while for 1:2, at a small positive value.Comment: 10 pages, 6 figure

Double layer for hard spheres with an off-center charge

Simulations for the density and potential profiles of the ions in the planar electrical double layer of a model electrolyte or an ionic liquid are reported. The ions of a real electrolyte or an ionic liquid are usually not spheres; in ionic liquids, the cations are molecular ions. In the past, this asymmetry has been modelled by considering spheres that are asymmetric in size and/or valence (viz., the primitive model) or by dimer cations that are formed by tangentially touching spheres. In this paper we consider spherical ions that are asymmetric in size and mimic the asymmetrical shape through an off-center charge that is located away from the center of the cation spheres, while the anion charge is at the center of anion spheres. The various singlet density and potential profiles are compared to (i) the dimer situation, that is, the constituent spheres of the dimer cation are tangentially tethered, and (ii) the standard primitive model. The results reveal the double layer structure to be substantially impacted especially when the cation is the counterion. As well as being of intrinsic interest, this off-center charge model may be useful for theories that consider spherical models and introduce the off-center charge as a perturbation.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figure

A treatment of the exclusion volume term in the inhomogeneous Poisson-Boltzmann theory for an ion-dipole mixture

The exclusion volume approximation in the Poisson-Boltzmann theory is analysed at the mean field level for an ion-dipole mixture against a plane, uniformly charged hard wall. An earlier treatment is extended to take account of the deviation of the exclusion volume term from the uncharged wall – uncharged hard sphere distribution function. Preliminary numerical results are presented for a 1:1 electrolyte at c = 1.0 mole/dm³ with unequal ion and dipole sizes.Наближення виключеного об’єму в теорії Пуассона-Больцмана аналізується на рівні середнього поля для іонно-дипольної суміші біля плоскої, однорідно зарядженої твердої стінки. Попередній розгляд є розширений до врахування відхилення члена виключеного об’єму від функції розподілу незаряджена стінка – незаряджена тверда сфера. Попередні числові результати є представлені для електроліту 1:1 при c=1.0 моль/дм³ з нерівними розмірами іонів і диполів

Ionic liquids at electrified interfaces

Until recently, “room-temperature” (<100–150 °C) liquid-state electrochemistry was mostly electrochemistry of diluted electrolytes(1)–(4) where dissolved salt ions were surrounded by a considerable amount of solvent molecules. Highly concentrated liquid electrolytes were mostly considered in the narrow (albeit important) niche of high-temperature electrochemistry of molten inorganic salts(5-9) and in the even narrower niche of “first-generation” room temperature ionic liquids, RTILs (such as chloro-aluminates and alkylammonium nitrates).(10-14) The situation has changed dramatically in the 2000s after the discovery of new moisture- and temperature-stable RTILs.(15, 16) These days, the “later generation” RTILs attracted wide attention within the electrochemical community.(17-31) Indeed, RTILs, as a class of compounds, possess a unique combination of properties (high charge density, electrochemical stability, low/negligible volatility, tunable polarity, etc.) that make them very attractive substances from fundamental and application points of view.(32-38) Most importantly, they can mix with each other in “cocktails” of one’s choice to acquire the desired properties (e.g., wider temperature range of the liquid phase(39, 40)) and can serve as almost “universal” solvents.(37, 41, 42) It is worth noting here one of the advantages of RTILs as compared to their high-temperature molten salt (HTMS)(43) “sister-systems”.(44) In RTILs the dissolved molecules are not imbedded in a harsh high temperature environment which could be destructive for many classes of fragile (organic) molecules

26th Annual Computational Neuroscience Meeting (CNS*2017): Part 3 - Meeting Abstracts - Antwerp, Belgium. 15–20 July 2017

This work was produced as part of the activities of FAPESP Research,\ud Disseminations and Innovation Center for Neuromathematics (grant\ud 2013/07699-0, S. Paulo Research Foundation). NLK is supported by a\ud FAPESP postdoctoral fellowship (grant 2016/03855-5). ACR is partially\ud supported by a CNPq fellowship (grant 306251/2014-0)

Methods for calculation interfacial tension from computer simulations

Interfaces have been recently a subject of profound interest for physicists, chemists and biologists because of the processes taking place in the interfacial region like adsorption, catalysis of chemical reactions etc. Computer simulations treat an interface in a full atomic level and by that they are a valuable complementary technique for experiment and theory. In this paper, different methods for the calculation of an interfacial tension by computer simulations are described and compared. The most commonly used method for the interfacial tension calculation was developed by Kirkwood-Buff. It is based on the mechanical route definition. This approach uses normal and tangential pressure components of the pressure tensor. The interfacial tension can be also evaluated through its thermodynamic definition. The method of Bennett defines the interfacial tension as the free energy difference of two (or more) systems relative to the difference in interfacial areas. The “test- -area” method is based upon the perturbation formalism. The test state is obtained from an infinitesimal change of the surface area of the reference system. The third method based on the thermodynamic route used to evaluate the interfacial tension is thought as an expanded ensemble simulation where two systems with different free energy and the interfacial area are connected by a discrete chain of intermediate subsystems. The next approach is based on the capillary wave theory formalism which provides a relationship between the surface tension and the wave width due the capillarity broadening. Interfacial tension may be also computed from the square gradient theory which is based on the expansion of the Hemholtz free energy in the Taylor series around the homogeneous state with the assumption that the molecular gradients in the interface are small compared to intermolecular distance. The theoretical basis, application and results of computer simulations of each method are presented. Aa accuracy of the methods in different simulation methodologies and systems is compared

Verification of Periodically Controlled Hybrid Systems: Application to an Autonomous Vehicle

This article introduces Periodically Controlled Hybrid Automata (PCHA) for modular specification of embedded control systems. In a PCHA, control actions that change the control input to the plant occur roughly periodically, while other actions that update the state of the controller may occur in the interim. Such actions could model, for example, sensor updates and information received from higher-level planning modules that change the set point of the controller. Based on periodicity and subtangential conditions, a new sufficient condition for verifying invariant properties of PCHAs is presented. For PCHAs with polynomial continuous vector fields, it is possible to check these conditions automatically using, for example, quantifier elimination or sum of squares decomposition. We examine the feasibility of this automatic approach on a small example. The proposed technique is also used to manually verify safety and progress properties of a fairly complex planner-controller subsystem of an autonomous ground vehicle. Geometric properties of planner-generated paths are derived which guarantee that such paths can be safely followed by the controller