Time-driven supervisory control of hybrid dynamical systems

This paper addresses the following hybrid control problem: a continuous plant (state evolving in Rⁿ) with signal and model uncertainty is to be controlled via symbolic output feedback-both measurement and control signal "live" on a finite set of symbols (e.g. "temperature too high", "too low", or "Ok"; "valve open or closed"). We adopt the following approach: the hybrid problem is first translated into a purely discrete problem by approximating the continuous plant model by a (nondeterministic) finite state machine. By taking into account past measurement and control symbols, approximation accuracy can be improved and adjusted to the specification requirements. Timed supervisory control theory for discrete event systems (DES) is then applied to find the optimal controller which guarantees certain desired closed-loop properties. These properties carry over from the discrete approximation to the underlying hybrid control system.