Predictor‐based tracking for neuromuscular electrical stimulation

We present a new tracking controller for neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES), which is an emerging technology that artificially stimulates skeletal muscles to help restore functionality to human limbs. The novelty of our work is that we prove that the tracking error globally asymptotically and locally exponentially converges to zero for any positive input delay, coupled with our ability to satisfy a state constraint imposed by the physical system. Also, our controller only requires sampled measurements of the states instead of continuous measurements and allows perturbed sampling schedules, which can be important for practical purposes. Our work is based on a new method for constructing predictor maps for a large class of time‐varying systems, which is of independent interest. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Robust global stabilisability by means of sampled-data control with positive sampling rate

This work proposes a notion of robust reachability of one set from another set under constant control. This notion is used to construct a control strategy, involving sequential set-to-set reachability, which guarantees robust global stabilisation of non-linear sampled data systems with positive sampling rate. Sufficient conditions for robust reachability of one set from another under constant control are also provided. The proposed method is illustrated through a number of examples, including the study of the sampled-data stabilisation problem of the chemostat.     

Global stability results for systems under sampled‐data control

In this work sufficient conditions for uniform input‐to‐output stability and uniform input‐to‐state stability are presented for finite‐dimensional systems under feedback control with zero‐order hold. The conditions are expressed by means of single and vector Lyapunov functions. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Non‐uniform in time robust global asymptotic output stability for discrete‐time systems

In this paper the notions of non‐uniform in time robust global asymptotic output stability (RGAOS) and input‐to‐output stability (IOS) for discrete‐time systems are studied. Characterizations as well as links between these notions are provided. Particularly, it is shown that a discrete‐time system with continuous dynamics satisfies the non‐uniform in time IOS property if and only if the corresponding unforced system is non‐uniformly in time RGAOS. Necessary and sufficient conditions for the solvability of the robust output feedback stabilization (ROFS) problem are also given. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Global stabilization and asymptotic tracking for a class of nonlinear systems by means of time‐varying feedback

A simple backstepping design scheme is proposed and sufficient conditions for non‐uniform in time global stabilization for parameterized systems by means of time‐varying feedback are established. Our methodology is applicable to a special class of systems that in general cannot be stabilized by static feedback and includes non‐holonomic systems in chained form. For this class of systems the main results on feedback stabilization enable us to derive sufficient conditions for the solvability of the tracking problem. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Stability and control of nonlinear systems described by retarded functional equations: a review of recent results

This paper reports on recent results in a series of the work of the authors on the stability and nonlinear control for general dynamical systems described by retarded functional differential and difference equations. Both internal and external stability properties are studied. The corresponding Lyapunov and Razuminkhin characterizations for input-to-state and input-to-output stabilities are proposed. Necessary and sufficient Lyapunov-like conditions are derived for robust nonlinear stabilization. In particular, an explicit controller design procedure is developed for a new class of nonlinear time-delay systems. Lastly, sufficient assumptions, including a small-gain condition, are presented for guaranteeing the input-to-output stability of coupled systems comprised of retarded functional differential and difference equations.     

Stabilization of nonlinear delay systems using approximate predictors and high-gain observers

We provide a solution to the heretofore open problem of stabilization of systems with arbitrarily long delays at the input and output of a nonlinear system using output feedback only. The solution is global, employs the predictor approach over the period that combines the input and output delays, addresses nonlinear systems with sampled measurements and with control applied using a zero-order hold, and requires that the sampling/holding periods be sufficiently short, though not necessarily constant. Our approach considers a class of globally Lipschitz strict-feedback systems with disturbances and employs an appropriately constructed successive approximation of the predictor map, a high-gain sampled-data observer, and a linear stabilizing feedback for the delay-free system. The obtained results guarantee robustness to perturbations of the sampling schedule and different sampling and holding periods are considered. The approach is specialized to linear systems, where the predictor is available explicitly.     

Non-uniform in time stabilization for linear systems and tracking control for non-holonomic systems in chained form

The paper contains certain results concerning non-uniform in time stabilization for linear time-varying systems by means of a linear time-varying feedback controller. These results enable us to present an explicit solution for the state feedback tracking control problem of non-holonomic systems in chained form under weaker hypotheses than those imposed in earlier existing works.     

Numerical schemes for nonlinear predictor feedback

This paper focuses on a specific aspect of the implementation problem for predictor-based feedback laws: the problem of the approximation of the predictor mapping. It is shown that the numerical approximation of the predictor mapping by means of a numerical scheme in conjunction with a hybrid feedback law that uses sampled measurements can be used for the global stabilization of all forward complete nonlinear systems that are globally asymptotically stabilizable and locally exponentially stabilizable in the delay-free case. Explicit formulae are provided for the estimation of the parameters of the resulting hybrid control scheme.     

Relaxed Lyapunov criteria for robust global stabilisation of non-linear systems

The notion of the restricted Robust Control Lyapunov Function (RCLF) is introduced and is exploited for the design of robust feedback stabilisers for non-linear systems. Particularly, it is shown for systems with input constraints that ‘restricted’ RCLFs can be easily obtained, while RCLFs are not available. Moreover, it is shown that the use of ‘restricted’ RCLFs usually results in different feedback designs from the ones obtained by the use of the standard RCLF methodology. Using the ‘restricted’ RCLFs feedback design methodology, a simple controller that guarantees robust global stabilisation of a perturbed chemostat model is provided.