Deutsch Intern
Chair of Computer Science VII - Robotics and Telematics

Observation and Control of Heterogeneous Dynamic Systems

Project Goals:

The main goals of the project lie in the comprehensive theoretical analysis and design of observer-based controllers for heterogeneous and digitally-networked dynamic systems. In particular, a contribution is to be made towards the theory of observer design for nonlinear systems with application to the control of satellite swarms and mobile robot systems.

Subproject 1: Control of heterogeneous systems over communications networks (Prof. Schilling)

The question of controller and observer design based on the quality of communication will be addressed. We build on experiences with accomplished hardware projects, such as satellite communication and remote control of mobile robots, in order to address the issue of controller design that takes into account the communication protocols being used. Moreover, the problem of effectively combining full autonomy and remote control in robotic systems will be of interest to characterize. [More information]

Subproject 2: Observer design under communication constraints
(Prof. Helmke)

Central topics of interest of the second subproject are the observer draft with nonlinear, digitally-networked systems as well as the development of new procedures for the decentralized estimation of more global condition-functional with networked systems. These tasks also contain necessary basic research on nonlinear observers such as: The development of an observer theory for estimating the condition-functional of polynomial systems, the specification and advancement of this theory for square differential equations on Lie algebras and Morse-Smale systems, and the development of communication and entropy barriers for observers of such systems.

This project is part of the program Control Theory for Digitally Networked Dynamic Systems, which is funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft.