IFAC Proceedings Volumes 

Abstract: Vehicles in formation often lack global information regarding the state of all the vehicles, a deficiency which can lead to instability and poor performance. In this paper, we demonstrate how exchange of minimal amounts of information between vehicles can be designed to realize a dynamical system which supplies each vehicle with a shared reference trajectory. When the information flow law is placed in the control loop, a separation principle is proven which guarantees stability of the formation and convergence of the information flow law regardless of the information flow topology.

Abstract: Less than half the Earth's landmass is accessible to existing wheeled and tracked vehicles. But people and animals using their legs can go almost anywhere. Our mission at Boston Dynamics is to develop a new breed of rough-terrain robots that capture the mobility, autonomy and speed of living creatures. Such robots will travel in outdoor terrain that is too steep, rutted, rocky, wet, muddy, and snowy for conventional vehicles. They will travel in cities and in our homes, doing chores and providing care, where steps, stairways and household clutter limit the utility of wheeled vehicles. Robots meeting these goals will have terrain sensors, sophisticated computing and power systems, advanced actuators and dynamic controls. We will give a status report on BigDog, an example of such rough-terrain robots.

Abstract: An algorithm for the numerical solution of parameterized optimal control problems is presented, which is based on multiple shooting in connection with a recursive quadratic progrmrming technique. A condensing algorithm for the solution of the approximating linearly constrained quadratic subproblems, and high rank update procedures are introduced, which are especially suited for optimal control problems and lead to significant improvements of the convergence behaviour and reductions of computing time and storage requirements. The algorithm is completely derivative-free due to internal numerical differentiation schemes, it can be conveniently combined with indirect multiple shooting. Numerical results are given in the field of aerospace engineering.

Abstract: This paper deals with further advances of the author's recent work on optimal design of control systems and Wiener filters. Specifically, we consider the problem of designing a system to control a plant when (1) not all state variables are measurable, (2) the measured state variables are contaminated with noise, and (3) there are random disturbances. An explicit design procedure (well adapted to digital computation) is presented. In addition, some fundamental new concepts (controllability, observability, etc.) are introduced. A general theory of control systems is outlined which answers many basic questions (what is controllable? why? how?) and gives a highly efficient method of computation. This paper is to be published in the Proceedings of the First IFAC Moscow Congress by Butterworth Scientific Publications in 1960.

Abstract: So called fuzzy control has been developed for the purpose of realization of a man-like controller with the aid of computer. However, most of fuzzy controllers have two very important problems. First is a defect of the reasoning algorithm. Second is a way to acquire control rules, particulaly the precise parameters in the rules. In this Daper considering the above problems, we propose a realistic fuzzy reasoning algorithm and a method to identify control rules from human operators actual control actions. Further we examine the performance of the proposed algorithm by applying it to water cleaning process control.