Feedforward feedback nearly optimal compensatory control for nonlinear interconnected large-scale systems

The optimal output tracking control problem for nonlinear large-scale dynamic systems is considered. A series-based approximate approach for designing the optimal controller is proposed with respect to quadratic performance indexes. By using the approach, the high order, coupling, nonlinear two-point boundary value problem is transformed into a sequence of linear decoupling two-point boundary value problems. By intercepting the frontal finite terms of the solution series, we obtained a suboptimal tracking control law. A simulation example illustrates the efficiency of the optimal output tracking control law designed.

Decentralized optimal controller design for multimachine power systems using successive approximation approach

A new feedforward and feedback optimal control law for a class of nonlinear systems with persistent disturbances is presented in this paper. By using a successive approximation approach (SAA), the original nonlinear optimal control problem is transformed into a sequence of nonhomogeneous linear two-point boundary value (TPBV) problems. The optimal control law obtained consists of analytical linear feedforward and feedback terms and a nonlinear compensation term which is the limit of the solution sequence for the adjoint vector differential equations. By using the finite-step iteration of nonlinear compensation sequence, we can obtain a feedforward and feedback suboptimal control law. A disturbance observer is designed to get a physically realizable controller. Simulation examples show the effectiveness of the approach.

An iterative method for suboptimal control of linear time-delayed systems

Optimal control methods have gained significant attention due to their promising performance in nonlinear systems. In general, an optimal control method is regarded as an optimization process for solving the optimal control laws. However, for uncertain nonlinear systems with complex optimization objectives, the solving of optimal reference trajectories is difficult and significant that might be ignored to obtain robust performance. For this problem, a double-closed-loop robust optimal control (DCL-ROC) is proposed to maintain the optimal control reliability of uncertain nonlinear systems. First, a double-closed-loop scheme is established to divide the optimal control process into a closed-loop optimization process that solves optimal reference trajectories and a closed-loop control process that solves optimal control laws. Then, the ability of the optimal control method can be improved to solve complex uncertain optimization problems. Second, a closed-loop robust optimization (CL-RO) algorithm is developed to express uncertain optimization objectives as data-driven forms and adjust optimal reference trajectories in a close loop. Then, the optimality of reference trajectories can be improved under uncertainties. Third, the optimal reference trajectories are tracked by an adaptive controller to derive the optimal control laws without certain system dynamics. Then, the adaptivity and reliability of optimal control laws can be improved. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method can achieve better performance than other optimal control methods.

The optimal control problem for nonlinear time-delay large-scale systems with persistent disturbances is considered. By using the successive approximation approach, the high order, coupled, nonlinear two-point boundary value (TPBV) problem with both time-delay and time-advance terms, which is derived from the necessary condition of the original optimal control problem, is transformed into a sequence of linear decoupled differential equations. By iteratively solving the sequence of linear differential equations, an optimal control law is obtained, which consists of analytic linear feedforward, feedback terms and a dynamic compensator. The feedforward term is used for persistent disturbance attenuation and the compensator is for the purpose of compensating nonlinearities and time delays. A suboptimal control law is obtained by truncating a finite term of the adjoint vector sequence as its compensator. An iterative algorithm to obtain the suboptimal control law is proposed. A simulation example illustrates the validity of the algorithm.

A EROSPACE engineering applications greatly stimulated the development of optimal control theory during the 1950s and 1960s, where the objective was to drive the system states in such a way that some defined cost was minimized. This turned out to have very useful applications in the design of regulators (where some steady state is to be maintained) and in tracking control strategies (where some predetermined state trajectory is to be followed). Among such applications was the problem of optimal flight trajectories for aircraft and space vehicles. Linear optimal control theory in particular has been very well documented and widely applied, where the plant that is controlled is assumed linear and the feedback controller is constrained to be linear with respect to its input. However, the availability of powerful low-cost microprocessors has spurred great advantages in the theory and applications of nonlinear control. The competitive era of rapid technological change, particularly in aerospace exploration, now demands stringent accuracy and cost requirements in nonlinear control systems. This has motivated the rapid development of nonlinear control theory for application to challenging, complex, dynamical real-world problems, particularly those that bear major practical significance in aerospace, marine, and defense industries. Infinite-time horizon nonlinear optimal control (ITHNOC) presents a viable option for synthesizing stabilizing controllers for nonlinear systems by making a state-input tradeoff, where the objective is to minimize the cost given by a performance index. The original theory of nonlinear optimal control dates from the 1960s. Various theoretical and practical aspects of the problem have been addressed in the literature over the decades since. In particular, the continuous-time nonlinear deterministic optimal control problem associated with autonomous (time-invariant) nonlinear regulator systems that are affine (linear) in the controls has been studied by many authors. The long-established theory of optimal control offers quite mature and well-documented techniques for solving this control-affine nonlinear optimization problem, based on dynamic programming or calculus of variations, but their application is generally a very tedious task. Bellman’s dynamic programming approach reduces to solving a nonlinear first-order partial differential equation (PDE), expressed by the Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman (HJB) equation. The solution to the HJB equation gives the optimal performance/cost value (or storage) function and determines an optimal control in feedback form under some smoothness assumptions. Alternatively, in the classical calculus of variations, optimal control problems can be characterized locally in terms of the Hamiltonian dynamics arising from Pontryagin’s minimum principle. These are the characteristic equations of the HJB PDE, which result in a nonlinear, constrained two-point boundary value problem (TPBVP) that, in general, can only be solved by successive approximation of the optimal control input using iterative numerical techniques for each set of initial conditions. Numerically, even though the nonlinear TPBVP is somewhat easier to solve than the HJBPDE, control signals can only be determined offline and are thus best suited for feedforward control of plants for which the state trajectories are known a priori. Therefore, contrary to the dynamic programming approach, the resultant control law is not generally in feedback form. Open-loop control, however, is sensitive to random disturbances and requires that the initial state be on the optimal trajectory. In contrast, nonlinear optimal feedback has inherent robustness properties (inherent in the sense that it is obtained by ignoring uncertainty and disturbances). The potential difficulty with the HJB approach is that no efficient algorithm is available to solve the PDE when it is nonlinear and the problem dimension is high, making it impossible to derive exact expressions for optimal controls for most nontrivial problems of interest. The optimal can only be computed in special cases, such as linear dynamics and quadratic cost, or very low-dimensional systems. In particular, if the plant is linear time invariant (LTI) and the (infinite-time) performance index is quadratic, then the corresponding HJB equation for this infamous linear-quadratic regulator (LQR) problem reduces to an algebraic Riccati equation (ARE). Contrary to the well-developed and widely applied theory and computational tools for theRiccati equation (for example, see [1]), theHJB equation is difficult, if not impossible, to solve for most practical applications. The exact solution for the optimal control policies is very complex

An efficient parallel processing optimal control scheme for a class of nonlinear composite systems

In this paper, the nonlinear optimal control problem is investigated for spacecraft formation flying with collision avoidance. Based on a nonlinear model of formation flying, two optimal tracking control laws are proposed to ensure the formation pattern converges to the predetermined configuration. The first optimal control law which combines Lyapunov optimizing control with a trajectory-following optimization technique is developed to solve the finite-time nonlinear optimal control problem. For the second controller, an extended [Formula: see text]-[Formula: see text] method is applied to design a closed-form feedback control scheme for nonlinear control problem of spacecraft formation flying with non-standard cost functions. By taking into account the flying safety, a repulsive control scheme is incorporated in the optimal controller to ensure collision avoidance and minimize the performance index. Finally, a numerical example is performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approaches.

Solution of linear two-point boundary value problems and optimal control of time-varying systems by shifted Chebyshev approximations

A highly computational efficient method to solve nonlinear optimal control problems

In this paper, a novel cooperative constrained distributed model predictive control algorithm is proposed to control the nonlinear interconnected constrained large-scale systems. In this algorithm, a novel reduced-order cooperative optimisation approach is proposed which is its main contribution that reconstructs and improves the global cost function of any local controller. In proposed algorithm, each local controller computes its optimal control by minimising the corresponding global cost function which is a combination of its own and its neighbouring subsystems’ cost functions. The sufficient conditions are derived to guarantee the recursive feasibility and closed-loop stability specifications to ensure the convergence of the overall states into the positive region which is the neighbourhood of origin. The performance of the proposed algorithm is illustrated via simulation results of a nonlinear large-scale cart-spring-damper system.

In this chapter, by using neural network (NN)-based online learning optimal control approach, a decentralized control strategy is developed to stabilize a class of continuous-time large-scale interconnected nonlinear systems . It is proven that the decentralized control strategy of the overall system can be established by adding appropriate feedback gains to the optimal control laws of the isolated subsystems . Then, an online policy iteration (PI) algorithm is developed to solve the Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman equations related to the optimal control problem. By constructing a set of critic NNs, the cost functions can be obtained by NN approximation, followed by the control laws. Furthermore, as a generalization, an NN-based decentralized control law is developed to stabilize the large-scale interconnected nonlinear systems using an online model-free integral PI algorithm. The model-free PI approach can solve the decentralized control problem for large-scale interconnected nonlinear systems with unknown dynamics. Finally, two simulation examples are provided to illustrate the effectiveness of the present decentralized control scheme.

MTN optimal control of MIMO non-affine nonlinear time-varying discrete systems for tracking only by output feedback

Rapid advances in information processing, communication and sensing technologies have enabled more and more devices to be provided with embedded processors, networking capabilities and sensors. For the field of estimation and control, it is now possible to consider an architecture in which many simple components communicate and cooperate to achieve a joint team goal. This distributed (or networked) architecture promises much in terms of performance, reliability and simplicity of design; however, at the same time, it requires extending the traditional theories of control, communication and computation and, in fact, looking at a unified picture of the three fields. A systematic theory of how to design distributed systems is currently lacking. This dissertation takes the first steps towards understanding the effects of imperfect information flow in distributed systems from an estimation and control perspective and coming up with new design principles to counter these effects. Designing networked systems is difficult because such systems challenge two basic assumptions of traditional control theory - presence of a central node with access to all the information about the system and perfect transmission of information among components. We formulate and solve many problems that deal with the removal of one, or both, of these assumptions. The chief idea explored in this dissertation is the joint design of information flow and the control law. While traditional control design has concentrated on calculating the optimal control input by assuming a particular information flow between the components, our approach seeks to synthesize the optimal information flow along with the optimal control law that satisfies the constraints of the information flow. Thus besides the question of 'What should an agent do?', the questions of 'Whom should an agent talk to?', 'What should an agent communicate?', 'When should an agent communicate?' and so on also have to be answered. The design of the information flow represents an important degree of freedom available to the system designer that has hitherto largely been ignored. As we demonstrate in the dissertation, the joint design of information flow and the optimal control input satisfying the constraints of that information flow yields large improvements in performance over simply trying to fit traditional design theories on distributed systems. We begin by formulating a distributed control problem in which many agents in a formation need to cooperate to minimize a joint cost function. We provide numerical algorithms to synthesize the optimal constrained control law that involve solving linear equations only and hence are free from numerical issues plaguing the other approaches proposed in the literature. We then provide and analyze a model to understand the issue of designing the topology according to which the agents interact. The results are very surprising since there are cases when allowing communication to happen between two agents may, in fact, be detrimental to the performance. We then move on to consider the effects of communication channels on control performance. To counter such effects, we propose the idea of encoding information for the purpose of estimation and control prior to transmission. Although information theoretic techniques are not possible in our problem, we are able to solve for a recursive yet optimal encoder / decoder structure in many cases. This information flow design oriented approach has unique advantages such as being optimal for any packet drop pattern, being able to include the effect of known but random delays easily, letting us escape the limits set by reliability for transmission of data across a network by using intermediate nodes as 'repeaters' similar to a digital communication network and so on. We finally take a look at combining the effects of multiple sources of information and communication channels on estimation and control. We look at a distributed estimation problem in which, at every time step, only a subset out of many sensors can transmit information to the estimator. This is also a representative resource allocation problem. We propose the idea of stochastic communication patterns that allows us to include the effects of communication channels explicitly during system design. Thus, instead of tree-search based algorithms proposed in the literature, we provide stochastic scheduling algorithms that can take into account the random packet drop effect of the channels. We also consider a distributed control problem with switching topologies and solve for the optimal controller. The tools that we develop are applicable to many other scenarios and we demonstrate some of them in the dissertation. Along the way, we look at many other related problems in the dissertation. As an example, we provide initial results about the issue of robustness of a distributed system design to a malfunctioning agent. This notion is currently lacking in the control and estimation community, but has to be a part of any effective theory for designing networked or distributed systems.