Modification via averaging of partial-energy-shaping control for creating oscillations: cart-pendulum example

We consider the challenging problem of creating oscillations in underactuated mechanical systems. Target oscillatory motions of the indirectly actuated degree of freedom of a mechanical system can often be achieved via a straightforward to design feedback transformation. Moreover, the corresponding part of the dynamics can be forced to match a desired second-order system possessing the target periodic solution (Aracil, J., Gordillo, F., and Acosta, J.A. (2002), ‘Stabilization of Oscillations in the Inverted Pendulum’, in Proceedings of the 15th IFAC World Congress, Barcelona, Spain; Canudas-de-Wit, C., Espiau, B., and Urrea, C. (2002), ‘Orbital Stabilisation of Underactuated Mechanical Systems’, in Proceedings of the 15th IFAC World Congress, Barcelona, Spain). Sometimes, it is possible to establish the presence of periodic or bounded motions for the remaining degrees of freedom in the transformed system. However, typically this motion planning procedure leads to an open-loop unstable orbit and by necessity should be followed by a feedback control design. We propose a new approach for synthesis of a (practically) stabilising feedback controller, which ensures convergence of the solutions of the closed-loop system into a narrow tube around the preplanned orbit. The method is illustrated in detail by shaping oscillations in the inverted pendulum on a cart around its upright equilibrium. The complete analysis is based on application of a non-standard higher-order averaging technique assuming sufficiently high frequency of oscillations and is presented for this particular example.     

An averaging approach to chattering

The singularly perturbed relay control systems (SPRCS) as mathematical models of chattering in the small neighborhood of the switching surface in sliding mode systems are examined. Sufficient conditions for existence and stability of fast periodic solutions to the SPRCS are found. It is shown that the slow motions in such SPRCS are approximately described by equations derived from equations for the slow variables of SPRCS by averaging along fast periodic motions. It is shown that In the general case, when the equations of a plant contain relay control nonlinearly, the averaged equations do not coincide with the equivalent control equations or with the Filippov's definition (1988) for the sliding motions in the reduced system; however, in the linear case, they coincide     

Analysis of periodic motions in relay feedback systems with saturation in plant dynamics

In this article a method of analysis of possible periodic motions in relay feedback systems that have saturation in plant dynamics is presented. Also, a methodology of analysis of local orbital stability of those periodic motions is proposed. The given analysis is based on the concept of the state locus of a relay feedback system. Techniques for computing the state locus are proposed. Also, a methodology of finding a periodic motion that involves the state locus is given. Finally, the proposed method is illustrated by an example.     

A frequency-domain approach to identification of mechanical systemswith friction

This paper describes a novel frequency-domain approach to identification of mechanical systems with friction on the basis of their periodic steady-state motions. Most importantly, the proposed method does not require acceleration information for its implementation. An interesting feature is that any periodic excitation input with sufficiently large amplitude and/or frequency can ensure the feasibility of the proposed method. We also present some experimental results to illuminate further its practical use     

Mean square stabilisation of complex oscillatory regimes in nonlinear stochastic systems

A problem of stabilisation of the randomly forced periodic and quasiperiodic modes for nonlinear dynamic systems is considered. For this problem solution, we propose a new theoretical approach to consider these modes as invariant manifolds of the stochastic differential equations with control. The aim of the control is to provide the exponential mean square (EMS) stability for these manifolds. A general method of the stabilisation based on the algebraic criterion of the EMS-stability is elaborated. A constructive technique for the design of the feedback regulators stabilising various types of oscillatory regimes is proposed. A detailed parametric analysis of the problem of the stabilisation for stochastically forced periodic and quasiperiodic modes is given. An illustrative example of stochastic Hopf system is included to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed technique.     

Averaging analysis of model reference adaptive identifier using least-square algorithm

Model reference adaptive identifiers (MRAI) are designed with the assumption that the reference model M¯ is strict positive real (SPR). The properties of MRAI with gradient algorithms have been well studied. In this paper we analyse the MRAI with least-square (LS) algorithms. It is found that a sufficient condition for the system stability is that M¯ ? ½ is SPR. A generic averaging technique is developed for the adaptive systems with periodic inputs. Then averaged systems of MRAI with the LS algorithm are formed. Simulation studies illustrate the properties of MRAI and verify the validity of the averaging approximation.     

Analysis and design of oscillatory control systems

This paper presents analysis and design results for control systems subject to oscillatory inputs, i.e., inputs of large amplitude and high frequency. The key analysis results are a series expansion characterizing the averaged system and various Lie-algebraic conditions that guarantee the series can be summed. Various example systems provide insight into the results. With regards to design, we recover and extend a variety of point stabilization and trajectory tracking results using oscillatory controls. We present novel developments on stabilization of systems with positive trace and on tracking for second order underactuated systems.     

Lyapunov characterization of forced oscillations

This paper develops a Lyapunov approach to the analysis of input-output characteristics for systems under the excitation of a class of oscillatory inputs. Apart from sinusoidal signals, the class of oscillatory inputs include multi-tone signals and periodic signals which can be described as the output of an autonomous system. The Lyapunov approach is developed for linear systems, homogeneous systems (differential inclusions) and nonlinear systems (differential inclusions), respectively. In particular, it is established that the steady-state gain can be arbitrarily closely characterized with Lyapunov functions if the output response converges exponentially to the steady-state. Other output measures that will be characterized include the peak of the transient response and the convergence rate. Tools based on linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) are developed for the numerical analysis of linear differential inclusions (LDIs). This paper's results can be readily applied to the evaluation of frequency responses of general nonlinear and uncertain systems by restricting the inputs to sinusoidal signals. Guided by the numerical result for a second order LDI, an interesting phenomenon is observed that the peak of the frequency response can be strictly larger than the L₂ gain.     

Periodic motion planning and control for underactuated mechanical systems

We consider the problem of periodic motion planning and of designing stabilising feedback control laws for such motions in underactuated mechanical systems. A novel periodic motion planning method is proposed. Each state is parametrised by a truncated Fourier series. Then we use numerical optimisation to search for the parameters of the trigonometric polynomial exploiting the measure of discrepancy in satisfying the passive dynamics equations as a performance index. Thus an almost feasible periodic motion is found. Then a linear controller is designed and stability analysis is given to verify that solutions of the closed-loop system stay inside a tube around the planned approximately feasible periodic trajectory. Experimental results for a double rotary pendulum are shown, while numerical simulations are given for models of a spacecraft with liquid sloshing and of a chain of mass spring system.     

A Trajectory-Based Approach for the Stability Robustness of Nonlinear Systems with Inputs

 We show, for two different definitions of semiglobal practical external stability, that the stability property holds on semi-infinite time intervals if and only if it holds on arbitrarily long but finite time intervals. These results have immediate applications in the analysis of the stability properties of highly oscillatory systems with inputs using averaging or for systems with inputs that are slowly varying. Results are stated for general flows and the stability is given with respect to arbitrary (not necessarily compact) sets. Date received: May 11, 2001. Date revised: March 14, 2002.     

Active filtering of physiological motion in robotized surgery using predictive control

This work presents a predictive-control approach to active mechanical filtering of complex, periodic motions of organs induced by respiration or heart beating in robotized surgery. Two different predictive-control schemes are proposed for the compensation of respiratory motions or cardiac motions. For respiratory motions, the periodic property of the disturbance has been included into the input-output model of the controlled system so as to have the robotic system learn and anticipate perturbation motions. A new cost function is proposed for the unconstrained generalized predictive controller (GPC), where reference tracking is decoupled from the rejection of predictable periodic motions. Cardiac motions are more complex, since they are the combination of two periodic nonharmonic components. An adaptive disturbance predictor is proposed which outputs future predicted disturbance values. These predicted values are used to anticipate the disturbance by using the predictive feature of a regular GPC. Experimental results are presented on a laboratory testbed and in vivo on pigs. They demonstrate the effectiveness of the two proposed methods to compensate complex physiological motion.     

MPC of constrained discrete-time linear periodic systems — A framework for asynchronous control: Strong feasibility, stability and optimality via periodic invariance

State-feedback model predictive control (MPC) of discrete-time linear periodic systems with time-dependent state and input dimensions is considered. The states and inputs are subject to periodically time-dependent, hard, convex, polyhedral constraints. First, periodic controlled and positively invariant sets are characterized, and a method to determine the maximum periodic controlled and positively invariant sets is derived. The proposed periodic controlled invariant sets are then employed in the design of least-restrictive strongly feasible reference-tracking MPC problems. The proposed periodic positively invariant sets are employed in combination with well-known results on optimal unconstrained periodic linear-quadratic regulation (LQR) to yield constrained periodic LQR control laws that are stabilizing and optimal. One motivation for systems with time-dependent dimensions is efficient control law synthesis for discrete-time systems with asynchronous inputs, for which a novel modeling framework resulting in low dimensional models is proposed. The presented methods are applied to a multirate nano-positioning system.     

Can we make a robot ballerina perform a pirouette? Orbital stabilization of periodic motions of underactuated mechanical systems

This paper provides an introduction to several problems and techniques related to controlling periodic motions of dynamical systems. In particular, we consider planning periodic motions and designing feedback controllers for orbital stabilization. We review classical and recent design methods based on the Poincaré first-return map and the transverse linearization. We begin with general nonlinear systems and then specialize to a class of underactuated mechanical systems for which a particularly rich structure allows many of the problems to be solved analytically.     

Exact Sampling of a Linear Interval Predictor

Recent advances in the design of interval observers have made it possible to ensure the non‐divergence of the computed state bounds from the stability of LTI systems under bounded inputs, with no need for additional monotony assumptions. Time‐varying changes of coordinates can be used to that purpose. Most of the related works result in either continuous‐time or discrete‐time interval dynamics. This paper proposes a constructive algorithm to compute the exact sampled response of a linear interval predictor under bounded inputs, gives a stability equivalence result and discusses the design of interval observers. The exact sampling requires held input bounds but the uncertain input itself needs not to be held. A numerical example exhibiting an oscillatory behavior illustrates the main results.     

Slow periodic motions in variable structure systems

Singularly perturbed relay control systems (SPRCS) with stable periodic motion in reduced systems are studied here. The slow motions integral manifold of such systems consists of parts that correspond to different values of control and the solutions of SPRCS contain the jumps from one part of the slow manifold to the other. The theorems about existence and stability of the slow periodic solutions are proved. An algorithm of asymptotic representation for this periodic solutions using a boundary layer method is suggested.     

Criteria of robust stability for time-varying 2D Wang–Mitchel differential systems: integral funnel method

Two-dimensional nonlinear systems with parametrical interval uncertainty are studied. Differential geometric extremal deviations method is developed. Its basic elements are integral funnels (IFs) and their boundaries. Extreme matrix-valued functions determining the branches of the boundaries of IFs are synthesised. Typical phase portraits of considered uncertain systems with different oscillatory properties are presented. Analytical criteria of robust stability for different oscillatory classes of uncertain systems are formulated.     

On periodic motions in relay systems containing blocks with limiters

A method of studying periodic motions in relay systems having a block with limiters is proposed. The method is based on the phase locus of the relay system. The means for constructing the phase locus, for determining with its help periodic motions arising in the system, and for studying their stability are considered.     

An LMI-based controller synthesis for periodic trajectories in a class of nonlinear systems

The use of finite-dimensional linear time-invariant controllers for the stabilization of periodic solutions in sinusoidally forced nonlinear systems is investigated. By mixing results concerning absolute stability of nonlinear systems and robustness of linear systems, a linear matrix inequality-based controller synthesis technique is developed. The synthesis algorithm yields the controller maximizing a lower bound of the maximum amplitude of the forcing input, for which the corresponding periodic solutions are guaranteed to be stable. The Duffing oscillator is employed to illustrate the main features of the proposed synthesis technique.     

A formalization of geometric constraint systems and their decomposition

For more than a decade, the trend in geometric constraint systems solving has been to use a geometric decomposition/recombination approach. These methods are generally grounded on the invariance of systems under rigid motions. In order to decompose further, other invariance groups (e.g., scalings) have recently been considered. Geometric decomposition is grounded on the possibility to replace a solved subsystem with a smaller system called boundary. This article shows the central property that justifies decomposition, without assuming specific types of constraints or invariance groups. The exact nature of the boundary system is given. This formalization brings out the elements of a general and modular implementation.     

The behavior of incrementally stable discrete time systems

This paper focus on the behavior analysis of incrementally bounded (Lipschitz continuous) systems on l_p with p[1,∞). We first establish the properties of the motions, which are associated with all inputs inside l_p^e with respect to a modification of the initial condition. As a matter of fact, under some minimality properties of the state–space realization of the system, we prove the Lyapunov stability of all unperturbed motions.As a second point, we investigate the properties of the motions obtained when the input is perturbed, either by perturbations which go to zero at the infinity, or by perturbations with a bounded magnitude.All these results are obtained through the reformulation of the incremental boundedness of a system in terms of the dissipativity of an associated fictitious system.