Energy Equivalent Expansion

This paper deals with the overlapping decomposition and expansions of a mechanical systems, such as flexible space structures, to simplify the decentralized control design. The approach suggested herein is to develop an expanded model which preserves the kinetic and potential energy of the original system. The resulting expanded system also maintains the symmetry in the model. Such an expanded system being non-unique, a constructive procedure is provided to produce an expanded system to yield subsystems with least interaction via a 2-norm minimization problem. Hence, the local control designs based upon the subsystems would be more justifiable.