Design of robust active queue management controllers for a class of TCP communication networks

Abstract

This paper describes the design of active queue management (AQM) controllers for a class of TCP communication networks. In TCP/IP networks, the packet-dropping probability function is considered as a control input. Therefore, a TCP AQM controller was modeled as a time-delayed system with a saturated input. The objective of the work described here was to design robust controllers capable of achieving the desired queue size and guaranteeing asymptotic stability of the operating point. To achieve this aim, we have proposed two control strategies, namely a static state feedback controller and an observer-based controller. By applying the Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional approach and the linear matrix inequality technique, control laws and delay-independent stability criteria for the AQM controllers were derived. The performance of the two control schemes was evaluated in various network scenarios via a series of numerical simulations. The simulation results confirm that the proposed schemes outperform other AQM schemes.