Subspace identification of MIMO LPV systems using a periodic scheduling sequence

A novel subspace identification method is presented which is able to reconstruct the deterministic part of a multivariable state-space LPV system with affine parameter dependence, in the presence of process and output noise. It is assumed that the identification data is generated with the scheduling variable varying periodically during the course of the identification experiment. This allows to use methods from LTI subspace identification to determine the column space of the time-varying observability matrices. It is shown that the crucial step in determining the original LPV system is to ensure the obtained observability matrices are defined with respect to the same state basis. Once the LPV model has been identified, it is valid for other nonperiodic scheduling sequences as well.     

Robust control of polytopic systems by convex optimization

Robust control synthesis of linear time-invariant SISO polytopic systems is investigated using the polynomial approach. A convex set of all stabilizing controllers for a polytopic system is given over an infinite-dimensional space. A finite-dimensional approximation of this set is obtained using the orthonormal basis functions and represented by a set of LMIs thanks to the KYP lemma. Then, an LMI based convex optimization problem for robust pole placement with sensitivity function shaping in two- and infinity-norm is proposed. The simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.     

Information cut for clustering using a gradient descent approach

We introduce a new graph cut for clustering which we call the Information Cut. It is derived using Parzen windowing to estimate an information theoretic distance measure between probability density functions. We propose to optimize the Information Cut using a gradient descent-based approach. Our algorithm has several advantages compared to many other graph-based methods in terms of determining an appropriate affinity measure, computational complexity, memory requirements and coping with different data scales. We show that our method may produce clustering and image segmentation results comparable or better than the state-of-the art graph-based methods.     

3D model retrieval using principal plane analysis and dynamic programming

Three dimensional models play an important role in many applications; the problem is how to select the appropriate models from a 3D database rapidly and accurately. In recent years, a variety of shape representations, statistical methods, and geometric algorithms have been proposed for matching 3D shapes or models. In this paper, we propose a 3D shape representation scheme based on a combination of principal plane analysis and dynamic programming. The proposed 3D shape representation scheme consists of three steps. First, a 3D model is transformed into a 2D image by projecting the vertices of the model onto its principal plane. Second, the convex hall of the 2D shape of the model is further segmented into multiple disjoint triangles using dynamic programming. Finally, for each triangle, a projection score histogram and moments are extracted as the feature vectors for similarity searching. Experimental results showed the robustness of the proposed scheme, which resists translation, rotation, scaling, noise, and destructive attacks. The proposed 3D model retrieval method performs fairly well in retrieving models having similar characteristics from a database of 3D models.     

Robust pole clustering in a good ride quality region of aircraft for matrices with structured uncertainties

This paper presents a general analysis of robust pole clustering in a good ride quality region (GRQR) of aircraft for matrices with structured uncertainties. This region is an intersection of a ring and a horizontal strip, located in the left half-plane, which is a specific non-Ω-transformable region providing good ride quality of aircraft. The paper applies the Rayleigh principle along the norm theory to analyze robust pole clustering within this region since the generalized Lyapunov theory is not valid for non-Ω-transformable regions. Concerned uncertainties are structured/parametric uncertainties, including interval matrices. The results are useful for robust control analysis and design, especially, of robust good ride quality of aircraft, shuttles, vehicles and space station, as well as some industrial systems. An example of the F-16 dynamics for which GRQR is suitable is included to illustrate the results.     

Robot control and parameter estimation with only joint position measurements

Most adaptive control schemes for rigid robots assume velocities measurements to be available. Although it is possible to measure velocities by using tachometers, this increases costs and the signals delivered may be contaminated with noise. Since the use of encoders allows to read joint position pretty accurately, it is desirable to estimate joint velocities through an observer. This paper presents an adaptive scheme designed in conjunction with a linear observer. Boundedness of the estimated parameters and uniform ultimate boundedness for the tracking and observation errors are guaranteed. Experimental results are included to support the developed theory.     

Blind estimation of the PN sequence in lower SNR DS-SS signals with residual carrier

This paper presents a method of singular value decomposition (SVD) plus digital phase lock loop (DPLL) to solve the difficult problem of blind pseudo-noise (PN) sequence estimation in low signal to noise ratios (SNR) direct sequence spread spectrum (DS-SS, DS) signals with residual carrier. Of course, the method needs to know the parameters of DS signal, such as the period and code rate of PN sequence. Firstly, the received signal is sampled and divided into non-overlapping signal vectors according to a temporal window, whose duration is two periods of PN sequence. Then, an autocorrelation matrix is computed and accumulated by the signal vectors one by one. The PN sequence with residual carrier can be estimated by the principal eigenvector of this autocorrelation matrix. Furthermore, a DPLL is used to deal with the estimated PN sequence with residual carrier, it estimates and tracks the residual carrier, removes the residual carrier in the end. Theory analysis and computer simulation results show that this method can effectively realize the PN sequence estimation from the input DS signals with residual carrier in lower SNR.     

Register allocation for write activity minimization on non-volatile main memory for embedded systems

Non-volatile memories are good candidates for DRAM replacement as main memory in embedded systems and they have many desirable characteristics. Nevertheless, the disadvantages of non-volatile memory co-exist with its advantages. First, the lifetime of some of the non-volatile memories is limited by the number of erase operations. Second, read and write operations have asymmetric speed or power consumption in non-volatile memory. This paper focuses on the embedded systems using non-volatile memory as main memory. We propose register allocation technique with re-computation to reduce the number of store instructions. When non-volatile memory is applied as the main memory, reducing store instructions will reduce write activities on non-volatile memory. To re-compute the spills effectively during register allocation, a novel potential spill selection strategy is proposed. During this process, live range splitting is utilized to split certain long live ranges such that they are more likely to be assigned into registers. In addition, techniques for re-computation overhead reduction is proposed on systems with multiple functional units. With the proposed approach, the lifetime of non-volatile memory is extended accordingly. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed technique can efficiently reduce the number of store instructions on systems with non-volatile memory by 33% on average.