On Fliess operators driven by L 2-Itô processes

Abstract

Fliess operators, which are a type of functional series expansion, have been used to describe a broad class of nonlinear input–output maps driven by deterministic inputs. But in most applications, a system's inputs have noise components. This paper has three objectives. The first objective is to show that the notion of a Fliess operator can be generalized to admit a class of L 2-Itô stochastic input processes. The next objective is to show that they converge absolutely over an arbitrarily large but finite time interval when a certain coefficient growth condition is met. However, a significant number of systems fail to meet this condition. Thus, the final objective is to consider an interval of convergence having a random length so that a Fliess operator might converge under less restrictive growth conditions.