Stabilization of artificial gas-lift process using nonlinear predictive generalized minimum variance control

Artificial gas-lift (AGL) is one of the most widely used methods in oil production to maintain acceptable oil flow to the processing equipment and sales when the reservoir pressure is not high enough. In spite of its popularity, the AGL process is prone to casing-heading instability, which is revealed as significant flow oscillation. This is undesirable as it results in production losses and unstable behavior that has negative impact on the downstream equipment. Controller design for such a process is very challenging as it exhibits highly nonlinear dynamics. In this work, the predictive generalized minimum variance control (NPGMV) is employed to derive a robust controller based on the state estimation to stabilize AGL process when casing-heading phenomenon occurs. A closed-form optimal control law is obtained based on the Taylor series approximation. Further, a nonlinear state observer is produced and combined with the controller to ensure closed-loop control through variables that are most beneficial to the system performance, which are unmeasurable and can be obtained only via estimation. Through simulation studies, the effectiveness of the proposed controller is demonstrated.     

Model transformation based sliding mode control of discrete-time two-dimensional Fornasini–Marchesini systems

This paper investigates the problem of sliding mode control (SMC) for discrete-time two-dimensional (2-D) systems subject to external disturbances. Given a 2-D Fornasini–Marchesini (FM) local state space model, attention is focused on designing the 2-D sliding surface and sliding mode controller, which guarantees the resultant closed-loop system to be asymptotically stable. Particularly, this problem is solved using the model transformation based method. First of all, sufficient conditions are formulated for the existence of a linear sliding surface guaranteeing the asymptotic stability of the equivalent sliding mode dynamics. Based on this, a sliding mode controller is synthesized to ensure that the associated 2-D FM system satisfies the reaching condition. The efficiency of the proposed 2-D SMC law design is shown by a numerical example. This paper extends the idea of model transformation to the 2-D systems and solves the SMC problem of a more general 2-D model in FM type for the first time.     

Model free adaptive iterative learning control for a class of nonlinear systems with randomly varying iteration lengths

This paper proposes a novel model free adaptive iterative learning control scheme for a class of unknown nonlinear systems with randomly varying iteration lengths. By applying the dynamic linearization technique along the iteration axis, such systems can be transformed into iteration-depended time varying linear systems. Then, an improved model free adaptive iterative learning control scheme can be constructed only using input and output data of the system. From the rigorous theoretical analysis, it is shown that the mathematical expectation of tracking errors converge to zero as iteration increases. This design does not require any dynamic information of the ILC systems and prior information of randomly varying iteration lengths. An illustrative example verifies the effectiveness of the proposed design.     

Robust multivariable predictive control for laser-aided powder deposition processes

This paper presents a robust multivariable predictive control for laser-aided powder deposition (LAPD) processes in additive manufacturing. First, a novel control-oriented MIMO process model is derived. Then, the objective of achieving desired geometrical and thermal properties is formulated as one of generating and tracking nominal reference profiles of layer height and melting pool temperature. This is accomplished via a nonlinear model predictive control with guaranteed nominal stability. Furthermore, a local ancillary feedback law is derived to provide robustness to bounded uncertainties. The paper verifies the effectiveness of the proposed control via a case study on a laser cladding process.     

Stability and bifurcation of delay-coupled genetic regulatory networks with hub structure

In this paper, we study the local stability and bifurcation of a delay-coupled genetic regulatory networks consisting of two modes with the hub structure. By analyzing the equilibrium equation, the number of the positive equilibria is discussed in both the cases that there are inhibition coupling and activation coupling in the networks. It is revealed that multiple equilibria could exist in the developed genetic networks and the number of the equilibria could be distinct under the two cases of delayed-coupling. For the equilibrium, the conditions of the coupling-delay-independent stability and the saddle-node bifurcation are derived with respect to the biochemical parameters. The coupling-delay-dependent stability and the Hopf bifurcation criteria on the biological parameters and the coupling delay are also given. Moreover, the complexity of the algorithm used in this paper is analyzed. The numerical simulations are made to certify the obtained results. The multistability of the developed genetic regulatory networks is displayed. The different effects of the coupling delay on the stability of the genetic networks under different biochemical parameters are shown.     

Consensus disturbance rejection with event-triggered communications

This paper considers the consensus disturbance rejection problem of networks of linear agents with event-triggered communications in the presence of matched disturbances. Based on the disturbance observer, distributed event-based consensus protocols are proposed and constructed for both the cases of neutrally stable and general linear agents. Under the proposed event-based consensus protocol, it is shown that the consensus errors are asymptotically stable and the Zeno behavior can be excluded. Compared to the previous related works, our main contribution is that the proposed event-based protocol can achieve consensus and meanwhile reject disturbance, without the need of continuous communications among neighboring agents. For the case of neutrally stable agents, the event-based protocol is fully distributed, using only the local information of each agent and its neighbors. Simulation results are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the theoretical results.     

Chattering-free full-order recursive sliding mode control for finite-time attitude synchronization of rigid spacecraft

This paper investigates a quaternion-based finite-time cooperative attitude synchronization and tracking of multiple rigid spacecraft with a virtual leader subject to bounded external disturbances. Firstly, the communication network between followers is assumed to be an undirected graph and every follower can get a direct access to the virtual leader, by using two neighborhood attitude error signals, a novel chattering-free recursive full-order sliding mode control algorithm is proposed such that all follower spacecraft synchronize to the virtual leader in finite time. In the proposed algorithm, the sliding mode surface is constructed by two layers of sliding mode surfaces, which are called as the outer and the inner sliding mode surfaces. To achieve finite-time performance of sliding mode dynamics, the outer sliding mode surface is designed as a terminal sliding mode manifold, and the inner one is designed as a fast nonsingular terminal sliding mode manifold, respectively. Then, to reduce the heavy communication burden, a distributed recursive full-order sliding mode control law is designed by introducing a distributed finite-time sliding mode estimator such that only a subset of the group members has access to the virtual leader. Finally, a numerical example is illustrated to demonstrate the validity of the proposed results.     

Semi-global leader-following coordination of multi-agent systems with input saturation and aperiodic intermittent communications

This paper addresses the semi-global leader-following coordination problem of general linear multi-agent systems, in which the control input of each agent is steered by aperiodically intermittent saturated actuator. Both the case with only one virtual leader and the case with multiple virtual leaders are discussed. By using multiple Lyapunov stability theory and applying algebraic Riccati equation-based low-gain feedback technique, sufficient conditions guaranteeing semi-global consensus tracking and semi-global containment tracking are provided. Numerical simulations finally verify the theoretical analysis.     

Adaptive synchronization of coupled harmonic oscillators under switching topology

This paper investigates the adaptive synchronization for coupled harmonic oscillators with switching topology. Edge-based adaptive control protocols are proposed for both leaderless and leader-following synchronization for coupled harmonic oscillators with switching topology. Using Lyapunov stability theory, by parting the topology graph into connected components (containing at least two connected vertices) and isolated vertex components (containing a isolated vertex), full distributed adaptive synchronization conditions are obtained, which can guarantee that the synchronization conditions do not require any global information except a mild connection assumption. Finally numerical simulations are presented to illustrate the theoretical findings.