Practical Solutions for Multivariable Control

Polynomial Control Systems is an application package in Control System Professional Suite. It expands the scope of Control System Professional with new tools for modeling, analysis, and design of linear control systems described by polynomial matrix equations or matrices with rational polynomial elements. For multivariable systems, these polynomial-based algorithms often provide designers with more informative and meaningful answers than the established state-space-based methods.

Polynomial Control Systems adds new control objects for the system-matrix and matrix-fraction models that complement and seamlessly integrate with existing state-space, transfer-function, and zero-pole-gain objects. All objects can be easily converted into each other and allow operations using the common set of functions. The application package further adds the Smith and McMillan standard forms for matrices and control objects, and provides a means for exploring multivariable poles and zeros of a control system and its related coprimeness, stability, functional controllability, decoupling zeros, and other properties.

There are also new design tools for reducing interactions between inputs and outputs in multivariable systems using the relative gain array, Nyquist array, characteristic locus, Perron-Frobenius scaling, and other methods.

Finally, Polynomial Control Systems contributes reduced-order-estimator and output-feedback-compensator algorithms to Control System Professional Suite's library of pole assignment algorithms.

"We have found PCS [Polynomial Control Systems] to be useful and comprehensive.... Some of the controller design and synthesis techniques are found to be unique... and can be helpful not only for practicing engineers but also for academicians pursuing research. Allowing exact and symbolic calculations for manipulations of polynomial matrices seems to be the greatest advantage of the toolbox. We believe, therefore, that the toolbox can also be used to teach some of the fundamental concepts of multivariable systems to graduate and possibly undergraduate students." Mehmet Turan Söylemez and İlker Üstoğlu "Polynomial Control Systems" IEEE Control Systems Magazine

About the Developer

The late Professor Neil Munro was a Fellow of the IEEE and the IEE, and head of the Control Systems Centre at the University of Manchester. A pioneering expert in the field, Dr. Munro made critical contributions to the control research community over the course of nearly 40 years.

Polynomial Control Systems requires Mathematica 5.0-5.2 and Control System Professional 2.0.3.