Time-varying Control Research Articles

Adaptive iterative learning control for enhancing the dynamic path tracking accuracy of 6-degrees of freedom industrial robots

In this article, an adaptive iterative learning control (AILC) scheme has been proposed to enhance the accuracy of the dynamic path tracking of 6-degrees of freedom industrial robots. Based on the memorized data and current feedback from a three-dimensional visual measurement instrument, an adaptive algorithm is developed to update the time-varying control parameters of the AILC scheme iteratively. A new compensation signal is calculated to adjust the control inputs produced by the dynamic path tracking control module at each time interval. Through the adaptation algorithm, the identical initial conditions can be relaxed to some extent with the AILC scheme. Moreover, the stability analysis of the proposed AILC scheme is presented. Experimental results on FANUC M20iA, using C-Track 780 as a photogrammetry sensor, demonstrate the superior performance of the developed AILC scheme in terms of pose accuracy, disturbance rejection ability, and control performance.

Transfer Learning-Based Physics-Informed Convolutional Neural Network for Simulating Flow in Porous Media with Time-Varying Controls

A physics-informed convolutional neural network (PICNN) is proposed to simulate two-phase flow in porous media with time-varying well controls. While most PICNNs in the existing literature worked on parameter-to-state mapping, our proposed network parameterizes the solutions with time-varying controls to establish a control-to-state regression. Firstly, a finite volume scheme is adopted to discretize flow equations and formulate a loss function that respects mass conservation laws. Neumann boundary conditions are seamlessly incorporated into the semi-discretized equations so no additional loss term is needed. The network architecture comprises two parallel U-Net structures, with network inputs being well controls and outputs being the system states (e.g., oil pressure and water saturation). To capture the time-dependent relationship between inputs and outputs, the network is well designed to mimic discretized state-space equations. We train the network progressively for every time step, enabling it to simultaneously predict oil pressure and water saturation at each timestep. After training the network for one timestep, we leverage transfer learning techniques to expedite the training process for a subsequent time step. The proposed model is used to simulate oil–water porous flow scenarios with varying reservoir model dimensionality, and aspects including computation efficiency and accuracy are compared against corresponding numerical approaches. The comparison with numerical methods demonstrates that a PICNN is highly efficient yet preserves decent accuracy.

Four-stage cascaded adaptive sliding mode control for automatic carrier landing with airwake disturbances and uncertainties

ObjectiveThis paper addresses the carrier landing affected by airwake, parametric uncertainties, and carrier deck motion, its main target being the design of a novel sliding mode based automatic carrier landing system to obtain accurate tracking of the reference trajectory, robustness in terms of disturbances and uncertainties, as well as excellent touchdown accuracy. ApproachFor an aircraft nonlinear dynamics, written under a four-stage cascaded strict feedback form, the design of the novel landing control architecture involves the design of a guidance subsystem, robust sliding mode controllers (for the control of the heading angle, attitude angles, and angular rates), an approach power compensation system, adaptive control laws suppressing the uncertainties and disturbances, a Kalman filter for deck motion prediction, a block computing the reference trajectory, a tracking differentiator block for deck motion compensation, and first-order command filters. Main resultsThe software validation process proves the effectiveness of the sliding mode based control scheme and the suppression of the uncertainties and disturbances. Also, the comparison between the performances of the sliding mode control based carrier landing system and the ones associated to other automatic carrier landing systems shows the superiority of the sliding mode based control scheme, as well as its better touchdown accuracy and landing success rate. SignificanceThis study innovatively transforms the general carrier landing problem into a time-varying tracking control problem for cascaded strict feedback dynamics with disturbances and uncertainties. The new designed automatic carrier landing system is the first control architecture in the literature employing the sliding mode control augmented by adaptive control laws for carrier landing, subjected to airwake, deck motion, and uncertainties.

Adaptive robust integrated guidance and control for thrust-vector-controlled aircraft by solving LQR online

In order to enhance the matching relationship between guidance subsystem and control subsystem of the thrust-vector-controlled aircraft, a kind of sufficient modeling and adaptive robust design facing to integrated guidance and control (IGC) is proposed. With respect to the researched aircraft, a linear state-dependent mathematical model facing to IGC design is first established. Based on the as-built model, a new kind of adaptive robust IGC law is proposed and it is composed by an adaptive optimal IGC law and a robustness-improved IGC law. In order to guarantee the global stability of time-varying control system, the adaptive optimal IGC law is designed by solving Riccati matrix equation on line and using matrix Sign function method. Furthermore, in order to enhance the robust ability against the unmatched system uncertainties, the robustness-improved IGC law is designed by using dynamic surface control approach and extended state observing strategy. Simulation results present that, the proposed IGC scheme presents more performance advantages compared with traditional IGC schemes, including the improvement of guidance precision and attitude stabilization. Furthermore, in the conditions of 256 simulation combinations, the minimum relative distances between aircraft position and target position are distributed from 0.103m to 5.333m, and the average value is 2.208m, which means the proposed IGC scheme possesses strong robustness against different and time-varying model uncertainties.

Surrogate model for reservoir performance prediction with time-varying well control based on depth generative network

This paper proposes a novel intelligent method for defining and solving the reservoir performance prediction problem within a manifold space, fully considering geological uncertainty and the characteristics of reservoirs performance under time-varying well control conditions, creating a surrogate model for reservoir performance prediction based on Conditional Evolutionary Generative Adversarial Networks (CE-GAN). The CE-GAN leverages conditional evolution in the feature space to direct the evolution of the generative network in previously uncontrollable directions, and transforms the problem of reservoir performance prediction into an image evolution problem based on permeability distribution, initial reservoir performance and time-varying well control, thereby enabling fast and accurate reservoir performance prediction under time-varying well control conditions. The experimental results in basic (egg model) and actual water-flooding reservoirs show that the model predictions align well with numerical simulations. In the basic reservoir model validation, the median relative residuals for pressure and oil saturation are 0.5% and 9.0%, respectively. In the actual reservoir model validation, the median relative residuals for both pressure and oil saturation are 4.0%. Regarding time efficiency, the surrogate model after training achieves approximately 160-fold and 280-fold increases in computational speed for the basic and actual reservoir models, respectively, compared with traditional numerical simulations. The reservoir performance prediction surrogate model based on the CE-GAN can effectively enhance the efficiency of production optimization.

Quantized Time-Varying Fault-Tolerant Control for a Three-Dimensional Euler–Bernoulli Beam With Unknown Control Directions

Quantized Time-Varying Fault-Tolerant Control for a Three-Dimensional Euler–Bernoulli Beam With Unknown Control Directions

Time-Varying Formation Control of Autonomous Surface Vehicles Based on Affine Observer

Time-Varying Formation Control of Autonomous Surface Vehicles Based on Affine Observer

Optimization of geological carbon storage operations with multimodal latent dynamic model and deep reinforcement learning

Identifying the time-varying control schemes that maximize storage performance is critical to the commercial deployment of geological carbon storage (GCS) projects. However, the optimization process typically demands extensive resource-intensive simulation evaluations, which poses significant computational challenges and practical limitations. In this study, we presented the multimodal latent dynamic (MLD) model, a novel deep learning framework for fast flow prediction and well control optimization in GCS operations. The MLD model implicitly characterizes the forward compositional simulation process through three components: a representation module that learns compressed latent representations of the system, a transition module that approximates the evolution of the system states in the low-dimensional latent space, and a prediction module that forecasts the flow responses for given well controls. A novel model training strategy combining a regression loss and a joint-embedding consistency loss was introduced to jointly optimize the three modules, which enhances the temporal consistency of the learned representations and ensures multi-step prediction accuracy. Unlike most existing deep learning models designed for systems with specific parameters, the MLD model supports arbitrary input modalities, thereby enabling comprehensive consideration of interactions between diverse types of data, including dynamic state variables, static spatial system parameters, rock and fluid properties, as well as external well settings. Since the MLD model mirrors the structure of a Markov decision process (MDP) that computes state transitions and rewards (i.e., economic calculation for flow responses) for given states and actions, it can serve as an interactive environment to train deep reinforcement learning agents. Specifically, the soft actor-critic (SAC) algorithm was employed to learn an optimal control policy that maximizes the net present value (NPV) from the experiences gained by continuous interactions with the MLD model. The efficacy of the proposed approach was first compared against commonly used simulation-based evolutionary algorithm and surrogate-assisted evolutionary algorithm on a deterministic GCS optimization case, showing that the proposed approach achieves the highest NPV, while reducing the required computational resources by more than 60%. The framework was further applied to the generalizable GCS optimization case. The results indicate that the trained agent is capable of harnessing the knowledge learned from previous scenarios to provide improved decisions for newly encountered scenarios, demonstrating promising generalization performance.

Research on Heave Compensation System Based on Switched Reluctance Motor

Aiming at the requirements of the marine work platform for real-time control, time-varying speed and the time-varying torque control of the motor-driven active heave compensation device, this paper introduces a composite control strategy based on the switched reluctance motor (SRM)-driven active heave compensation device. As for the compensation error caused by the time lag in the real-time system, the model prediction trajectory algorithm is used to predict the compensation displacement obtained using the dynamic model. The next time, the control parameters are then provided for the SRM control system in advance to reduce the compensation error. The SRM control strategy selects a double closed-loop compound control strategy of Back Propagation (BP) fuzzy neural network Proportion Integration Differentiation (PID) control. Its outer speed loop uses a fuzzy controller to quickly track a wide range of speed changes. The torque inner loop uses BP neural network adaptive PID control. This helps to reduce torque ripple and to ensure that the electromagnetic torque output of the SRM remains stable. Finally, the system feasibility is verified by setting different wave parameters. The simulation results show that the simulation conditions can reach 97.5% and 96.4% under the 3 and 4 wave levels, respectively. The simulation effect is satisfying, which verifies the feasibility of the proposed scheme.

Model predictive control with real-time variable weight for civil aircraft towing taxi-out control systems

Unlike the traditional method of taxying, where civil aircraft reach the runway by relying on their engines, the new mode of towing taxi-out may become preferred because of its lower energy consumption, lower emissions, and higher efficiency. To improve the tracking accuracy and lateral stability of the towing system, this study used a two-level time-varying weight control method (RMPC) based on model predictive control (MPC) and fuzzy control. The tractor speed and front wheel angle were set as the control variables in the MPC controller, and the real-time lateral displacement error and yaw angle error of the tractor were set as the fuzzy control inputs. The influence of the weight matrix on the accuracy and stability of path tracking was coordinated by online optimization of the MPC objective function weight. The simulations of multiple working conditions were performed using TruckSim software in Simulink, which showed that the proposed control method can limit the lateral displacement error of the tractor and aircraft within 0.4 m, which can be reduced by 70.83% and 77.4% compared with the single MPC, respectively. Additionally, the maximum yaw angle errors of the tractor and aircraft are reduced by 76.11% and 51.31% compared with the single MPC, respectively. Furthermore, the yaw angle error of tractors can be limited to 4° and that of aircraft can be limited to 6.5°, which is an improvement of the lateral stability and driving safety for the civil aircraft towing system. The new controller may provide technical insights and support for the practical development and safe application of the towing taxi-out mode.

Bumpless transfer control for switched time-delay systems with application to aero-engine control

For switched time-delay systems, the bumpless transfer control issue is investigated by utilizing the multiple piecewise Lyapunov–Krasovskii function approach. First, a time-delay-dependent bumpless transfer concept is put forward to depict the transient performance of switched time-delay systems, which restricts the bumps in the amplitude of the present state and the time-delay state, simultaneously. Second, a state-dependent switching signal with a prescribed time is designed to avoid switching frequently. A time-varying switching controller is developed to decrease control bumps. Third, under the premise of achieving asymptotic stability, a solvability condition ensuring a satisfactory bumpless transfer performance is derived through relaxing the traditional bumpless transfer condition. Finally, an instance of the aero-engine control system is used for exhibiting the validity of the presented method.

EMG model calibration and trajectory tracking of rehabilitation exoskeleton by asynchronous tele-training

ABSTRACT This study presents a novel kinematic tracking model, designed for a networked exoskeleton system that is asynchronously taught by a remote therapist. The therapist’s rehabilitation exercises are quantitatively assessed using a monocular vision system. The resultant metrics are then transmitted asynchronously over the network to patients equipped with exoskeletons. The exoskeleton utilises these metrics as reference paths for exercises, complemented by electromyography (EMG) feedback. This work introduces a calibration approach aimed at estimating angular positions by utilising EMG observations. The calibration model establishes real-time correlations between polynomial reference positions. We further explore redundant kinematics, incorporating an EMG observer for linear, time-variant rehabilitation tracking control. Our methodology is validated using vision-based metric data and experimental EMG measurements including shoulder flexion, elbow flexion, and rowing-like movements. Computer simulations demonstrate the system’s ability to reliably, robustly, and effectively follow desired trajectories. This research offers a promising approach for remote personalized rehabilitation.

Reducing Urban Traffic Congestion Using Deep Learning and Model Predictive Control.

This article proposes a deep learning (DL)-based control algorithm-DL velocity-based model predictive control (VMPC)-for reducing traffic congestion with slowly time-varying traffic signal controls. This control algorithm consists of system identification using DL and traffic signal control using VMPC. For the training process of DL, we established a modeling error entropy loss as the criteria inspired by the theory of stochastic distribution control (SDC) originated by the fourth author. Simulation results show that the proposed algorithm can reduce traffic congestion with a slowly varying traffic signal control input. Results of an ablation study demonstrate that this algorithm compares favorably to other model-based controllers in terms of prediction error, signal varying speed, and control effectiveness.

Leader-follower formation control of nonholonomic mobile robots subject to robots failure

Over the years, control of autonomous vehicles in a defined formation has been the subject of much research. Albeit leader-follower approach being one of the most used in formation control, it suffers a major practical drawback of leader failure while cruising in formation. In this work, we aim to solve this problem by proposing a novel assignment algorithm that assigns a new leader from the follower robots to ensure robots complete their given task when their leader fails. This algorithm also assign role to new robots joining the group, as well as the failed robot when rescued back to the team. We drive robots towards their desired trajectories to achieve formation using a Lyapunov-based time-varying state tracking controller from the literature. Due to role switching amongst member robots, we propose a new variant of the limit-cycle obstacle avoidance algorithm to ensure smooth and collision free transition. Simulations and experiments are performed using the robot operating system framework due to its flexibility to verify the effectiveness and reliability of the proposed algorithms.

Robust control design of uncertain nonlinear systems: a self-compensating and self-tuning approach

ABSTRACT The problem of robust stabilisation is considered for a class of uncertain nonlinear systems with linear control term. It is not required that the unforced nominal (nonlinear) system has to be stable and/or has to be known, which means that its Lyapunov function need not be known and/or found for designing a stabilising control scheme to compensate the effect of uncertainty on the systems like some traditional control design approaches. For such a class of uncertain nonlinear systems, a design approach, called a self-compensating and self-tuning one, is presented whereby some robust state feedback control schemes can be easily synthesised. The proposed design approach can result in a linear state feedback control scheme with a time-varying control gain for such a class of uncertain nonlinear systems, which implies the simplicity of the design approach and control results. In addition, the system uncertainty is also not required to have to satisfy the matching conditions.

A robust design of time-varying internal model principle-based control for ultra-precision tracking in a direct-drive servo stage

This paper proposes a robust design of the time-varying internal model principle-based control (TV-IMPC) for tracking sophisticated references generated by linear time-varying (LTV) autonomous systems. The existing TV-IMPC design usually requires a complete knowledge of the plant I/O (input/output) model, leading to the lack of structural robustness. To tackle this issue, we, in this paper, design a gray-box extended state observer (ESO) to estimate and compensate unknown model uncertainties and external disturbances. By means of the ESO feedback, the plant model is kept as nominal, and hence the structural robustness is achieved for the time-varying internal model. It is shown that the proposed design has bounded ESO estimation errors, which can be further adjusted by modifying the corresponding control gains. To stabilize the ESO-based TV-IMPC, a time-varying stabilizer is developed by employing Linear Matrix Inequalities (LMIs). Extensive simulation and experimental studies are conducted on a direct-drive servo stage to validate the proposed robust TV-IMPC with ultra-precision tracking performance (∼60nm RMSE out of ±80mm stroke).

A smoothing approximation-based adaptive neurodynamic approach for nonsmooth resource allocation problem

In this paper, a smoothing approximation-based adaptive neurodynamic approach is proposed for a nonsmooth resource allocation problem (NRAP) with multiple constraints. The smoothing approximation method is combined with multi-agent systems to avoid the introduction of set-valued subgradient terms, thereby facilitating the practical implementation of the neurodynamic approach. In addition, using the adaptive penalty technique, private inequality constraints are processed, which eliminates the need for additional quantitative estimation of penalty parameters and significantly reduces the computational cost. Moreover, to reduce the impact of smoothing approximation on the convergence of the neurodynamic approach, time-varying control parameters are introduced. Due to the parallel computing characteristics of multi-agent systems, the neurodynamic approach proposed in this paper is completely distributed. Theoretical proof shows that the state solution of the neurodynamic approach converges to the optimal solution of NRAP. Finally, two application examples are used to validate the feasibility of the neurodynamic approach.

Tracking control via time-varying feedback for an uncertain robotic system with both output constraint and dead-zone input

This paper is devoted to the tracking control for an uncertain robotic system with both output constraint and dead-zone input. Remarkably, the distinctive characters of the system are reflected by system uncertainties and output constraint. First, more serious uncertainties are involved since unknown nonlinear dynamic matrices, external disturbance and the dead-zone input (see unknown slopes and break points therein) are simultaneously considered, but those of the related literature are not. Second, weaker conditions on the output constraint are allowed since the constraint functions considered are only first but not more order continuously differentiable while any their time derivatives are not necessarily available for feedback. This leads to the incapability of the traditional control schemes on this topic. To solve the control problem, a novel control framework is proposed based on time-varying feedback which overcomes the serious system uncertainties while relaxes the conditions on output constraints. Specifically, a state transformation with a time-varying gain is first introduced to derive a new system. Then, by using the traditional backstepping method with the introduction of the time-varying gain in the estimations of some uncertain terms, a time-varying feedback controller is explicitly designed, which ensures that all the states of the resulting closed-loop system are bounded while system output asymptotically tracks the reference signal without any violation of the output constraint. Finally, simulation results for two practical examples are provided to validate the effectiveness of the proposed theoretical results, and moreover, a comparison with PID method is given to show the superiority of the proposed method on tracking accuracy and robustness.

Periodic event-triggered adaptive neural control of USVs under replay attacks

This work aims to address the control issue of unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) under replay attacks, where the influence of internal/external uncertainties and actuator’s physical constraints are taken into account. In the control design, a hyperbolic tangent function is used to replace the actuator saturation nonlinearity. To solve the design problem of mismatched unknown time-varying control gain caused by replay attacks, the single-parameter-learning technique is introduced, which avoids the operation of estimating for the unknown gain directly. To compensate for the effect of lumped uncertainties including attacks, unknown dynamics and external disturbances, the adaptive neural network with the finite covering principle is involved in the kinematic and dynamic channels, respectively. Furthermore, to reduce the update rate of actuator and alleviate the actuator wear, a periodic event-triggering mechanism (PETM) is established in the controller-actuator (C-A) channel. Finally, a periodic event-triggered (PET) adaptive neural tracking control solution for USVs under replay attacks is proposed, and it is verified that the control solution can force the trajectory of USVs to follow the reference trajectory even if there exists the effect of replay attacks. In addition, all signals in the closed-loop control system of USVs under replay attacks are bounded, and simulation and comparison results demonstrate the effectiveness of the control strategy.

Multi-shaker time-varying root mean square non-stationary random vibration environmental control test

The current multi-shaker random control methods concentrate on the simulation of stationary vibrations. This work presents an innovative technique for multi-shaker non-stationary random vibration environmental control test. Firstly, an amplitude modulation method is introduced to generate multi-input non-stationary random signals with time-varying root mean square values, whose kurtoses and moving RMS values are specified by amplitude modulation functions. Then, the generated signals are applied as excitation signals for the non-stationary random vibration environmental control test. The response signals of a linear vibration system under non-stationary excitations are derived in the frequency domain. The derived formulas for kurtoses and moving RMS values are also applicable to non-stationary response signals. Meanwhile, the stationary power spectral densities of response signals are put forward. When the amplitude modulation functions are zero mean Gaussian distributions, the power spectral densities of the response signals can be directly calculated. Ultimately, the control of kurtoses, moving RMS values and stationary power spectral densities of response non-stationary random signals is realized. Simulation and experimental examples both adopt a two-input two-output beam vibration system and the results prove the correctness and practicability of the proposed method. The presented control procedure is concise and efficient in simulating multi-shaker non-stationary random vibration environments.