Research group "Distributed-Parameter Systems"

Technological processes with dynamics depending both on space and time lead to distributed-parameter systems, which are described by partial differential equations. The research group "Distributed-Parameter Systems" develops new methods for the control as well as for the fault diagnosis of distributed-parameter systems. For this also an information exchange through communication networks are utilized to solve cooperative control and fault diagnosis problems. Important application areas range from flexible structures, chemical reactors to electro-chemical energy storage systems.

Team

Publications

Current scientific contributions of our research group can be found in the publication list of the institute.

Teaching

In order to intensify the topics of the research group in the master programme, the lectures "Regelung verteilt-parametrischer Systeme" and "Automatisierungstechnik: Ereignisdiskrete und Multi-Agenten-Systeme" are offered in German.

Thesis

For our research problems always Bachelor and Master thesis are available. Furthermore, it is possible to work in our research group in form of a student job. An overview can be found at Studentische Arbeiten of the institute.

Current Research Projects

In this research project new methods are derived for extending the backstepping approach to coupled PDE and PDE-ODE systems. This class of distributed-parameter systems (DPS) arise frequently in applications. Examples are chemical reactors described by their temperature and concentration profiles, DPS with dynamic boundary conditions, with finite-dimensional actuator and sensor dynamics or with input and output delays. The work in this project focuses on new backstepping-based design procedures for observer-based compensators.

Selected publications

Deutscher, J. and Gabriel, J.: Fredholm backstepping control of coupled linear parabolic PDEs with input and output delays.
IEEE Trans. Autom. Control, in press, 2019.
Kerschbaum, S. and Deutscher, J.: Backstepping control of coupled linear parabolic PDEs with space and time dependent coefficients.
IEEE Trans. Autom. Control, in press, 2019.
Deutscher, J., Gehring, N. and Kern, R.: Output feedback control of general linear heterodirectional hyperbolic ODE-PDE-ODE systems.
Automatica 95 (2018), pp. 472-480.
Deutscher, J. and Kerschbaum, S.: Backstepping control of coupled linear parabolic PIDEs with spatially varying coefficients.
IEEE Trans. Autom. Control 63 (2018), pp. 4218-4233.

Contact

Please contact Joachim Deutscher for further Information.

Besides the pure stabilization an additional basic property of a controller is to achieve the asymptotic tracking of online prescribed reference inputs in the presence of disturbances. If these exogenous signals are describable by a signal model, then the output regulation theory provides a systematic framework for the controller design. In this research project the backstepping approach for boundary controlled distributed-parameter systems is combined with results from output regulation theory. This yields new systematic procedures to determine output feedback regulators for distributed-parameter systems.

Selected publications

Deutscher, J. and Kerschbaum, S.: Robust output regulation by state feedback control for coupled linear parabolic PIDEs.
IEEE Trans. Autom. Control 65 (2020), pp. 2207-2214.
Deutscher, J. and Kerschbaum, S.: Output regulation for coupled linear parabolic PIDEs. Automatica 100 (2019), pp. 360-370.
Deutscher, J. and Gabriel, J.: Robust state feedback regulator design for general linear heterodirectional hyperbolic systems. IEEE Trans. Autom. Control 63 (2018), pp. 2620-2627.
Deutscher, J.: Output regulation for general linear heterodirectional hyperbolic systems with spatially-varying coefficients. Automatica 85 (2017), pp. 34-42.
Deutscher, J.: Backstepping design of robust state feedback regulators for linear 2x2 hyperbolic systems. IEEE Trans. Autom. Control 62 (2017), pp. 5240-5247.
Deutscher, J.: Finite-time output regulation for linear 2x2 hyperbolic systems using backstepping. Automatica 75 (2017), pp. 54-62.
Deutscher, J.: Backstepping design of robust output feedback regulators for boundary controlled parabolic PDEs. IEEE Trans. Autom. Control 61 (2016), pp. 2288-2294.
Deutscher, J.: A backstepping approach to the output regulation of boundary controlled parabolic PDEs. Automatica 57 (2015), pp. 56-64.