Design of hierarchically distributed expert controllers for large-scale systems

An architecture with expert distributed controllers to control large functional systems hierarchically is considered. A structural hierarchy was formed based on the physical structure of the system and functions associated with the structure. The hierarchy and the functional associations are described completely by the structural and functional coordinability axioms. These axioms display a very specific type of hierarchical structure. One of the properties of the hierarchy is that the whole system is represented both at the top and at the tip levels. It has the ability to represent the whole system at any desired detail. Moreover, representational redundancies are deliberately allowed, but the top and tip levels are forced to be represented without redundancies. The authors define the functional behavior of the system and the expert controller via six primitives. These primitives express the functions, capabilities, restrictions, and information to control the behavior of the system. Finally, the control process is described as a uniform flow from top to tip