Reducibility of Linear Systems

When synithesizinig a linear system which is described bv a linear ordinary differential equation, it is desirable to have the equatiotn reduced to the lowest possible order since the number of components increases with the order of the equation. In this paper the concept of reducibility of linear differential equations is discussed. Reducibility is defined as the property which allows a differential equation to be redulced to an equivalent lower-order differential equation. A criterion for reducibility and a technique for the reduction of linear differential equations are presented.