On the dual effect in state-based scheduling of networked control systems

In this paper, we show that there is a dual effect with state-based scheduling. In general, this makes the optimal scheduler and controller hard to find. However, by removing past controls from the scheduling criterion, we find that certainty equivalence holds. This condition is related to the classical result of Bar-Shalom and Tse, and it leads to the design of a sub-optimal scheduler with a certainty equivalent controller. Furthermore, we show that a mapping of the state-based scheduler into one which fulfills this condition, and consequently has an optimal certainty equivalent controller, does not result in an equivalent class of design in the sense of Witsenhausen. Computing the estimate remains hard, but can be simplified by introducing a symmetry constraint on the scheduler.