Introduction to

Intelligent Control

Artificial Intelligence for

Control and Identification
Dr. Wilbert G. Aguilar
Ph.D. in Automatic Control, Robotics and Computer Vision

2007 Dr. X. Parra & Dr. C. Angulo 0

 Outline

1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Introduction to Intelligent Control

2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

3. Applications of Intelligent Control

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Control Engineering

Objective of Control
Introduction to Intelligent Control

make a dynamical system behave in a desired manner,

according to some performance specifications

We want aerodynamics
excitations
highly dynamic performance
very robust behaviors

but we have
very complex systems (many inputs
and many outputs, dynamic coupling,
highly nonlinear, )
control
control surfaces
unknown dynamics
engine excitations
unknown excitations excitations

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Some terminology

Plant or Process: system to be controlled

Introduction to Intelligent Control

Inputs: excitations (known or unknown) to the system

Outputs: responses of the system
Sensors: measure system variables (excitations or responses)
Actuators: drive various parts of the system
Controller: device that generates control signal
Control law: scheme according to which the control signal is generated
Control system: plant + controller (at least)
Open-loop control: no feedback of plant response to controller
Close-loop control: control signal is determined according to plant
response (feed-back control) or plant inputs (feed-forward control)

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Conventional Control

Conventional control systems design relies on the

Introduction to Intelligent Control

existence of an adequate model of the plant to be

controlled :
Step1: development of an explicit mathematical model

Step2: design of a controller satisfying performance

specifications

Step3: implementation of the controller

Designing a conventional controller is a tedious and

careful process that requires repeated cycles of
analysis, synthesis and testing, and which hopefully
converges to an acceptable solution.

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Conventional Control

Conventional control techniques:

Introduction to Intelligent Control

Pole placement: locate system poles for stability, speed of

response, etc.
Linear quadratic regulator (LQR): minimize a cost function.
Linear quadratic gaussian (LQG) control: LQR plus a Kalman
filter.
Nonlinear feedback control: feedback signal is applied to
compensate for nonlinear effects.
Adaptive control: controller parameters are adjusted according to a
performance criterion.
Sliding mode control: signal is switched between control laws.
H control: H-infinity norm (a performance criterion) is minimized.

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Conventional Control

Main characteristics:
Introduction to Intelligent Control

Typically based on mathematical models

The input-output-dynamic state structure is rigidly defined

Performance objectives are specified in a non-qualitative manner

(numerical or analytical) and analytical control schemes are
developed to meet the objectives

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Conventional Control

Main drawbacks:
Introduction to Intelligent Control

Typically, theory driven, not problem driven (analytical control schemes

are developed first. In what practical situations they may be applicable are
investigated after that)

The control problem is addressed separately, not integral with the

plant design

Qualitative information, experience, heuristics, common sense, etc.

are not directly used in the control algorithm

Typically requires complete knowledge about the model (e.g.,

parameter values) and the inputs

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 1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Intelligent Control

Intelligent control seeks to establish some kind of cognitive

Introduction to Intelligent Control

model of the controller (the human operator) and not the plant
under his control.
An Intelligent Controller should be self-organized or adaptive,
and be able to work naturally with significant changes in the plant
and/or the environment and, at the same time, satisfy the
requirements of control design.

Intelligence in a system makes reference to its ability to

learn or to adapt, and to modify its functional
dependencies in response to new experiences or
due to changes in the functional relation

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 Outline

1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Introduction to Intelligent Control

2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

3. Applications of Intelligent Control

9
 2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

Rationale for Intelligent Control

Humans are good at

Introduction to Intelligent Control

effectively handle incomplete, imprecise and fuzzy

information in making intelligent decisions

reasoning in an approximate, qualitative and soft way

but not so good because

they are expensive

are they reliable? How do we guarantee this?

we do not understand the dynamical behavior of

biological systems very well

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 2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

Rationale for Intelligent Control

Intelligent Control aims to mimic human control (e.g.,

Introduction to Intelligent Control

incorporate operating experience, heuristics, control expertise,

expert know-how, etc.).

Since currently we only use crude models of biological

systems, it is best to view Intelligent Control as a goal
rather than a reality.

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 2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

Advantages of Intelligent Control

An explicit model of the plant/process is not required

Introduction to Intelligent Control

Human experience and qualitative knowledge can be incorporated

Imprecise, general and approximate knowledge may be incorporated
Explicit optimization is not needed (optimization is implicit)
Learning and self-organization is possible (e.g., through neural networks)
Performance improves with experience (fuzzy-neural-genetic)
Robust (tolerates uncertainties, incomplete knowledge, model error, noise, etc.)
Suitable for large-scale and complex systems (where analytical modeling
is difficult; important input-output signals may not be available for measurement)

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 2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

Popular approaches

Neural Networks: are structures of massively

Introduction to Intelligent Control

connected nodes that can accurately represent a

complex system without using an analytical model.
They are inspired in the neuron structure in brain,

Fuzzy Logic: uses fuzzy rules (e.g., expert knowledge)

and approximate reasoning to generate control actions.
It is inspired in the human knowledge and reasoning.

Genetic Algorithms: are a derivative-free optimization

technique that performs a search to evolve the most fit
population. They are inspired in biological evolution,
selection and genetics.

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 Outline

1. Conventional vs. Intelligent Control

Introduction to Intelligent Control

2. Techniques of Intelligent Control

3. Applications of Intelligent Control

14
 3. Applications of Intelligent Control

Why do we need Intelligent Control?

Learning can be required for many reasons:

Introduction to Intelligent Control

There is not a-priori knowledge of the plant structure or it is

too scarce

Plant is time-variant

Operational environment is time-variant and/or partially

unknown

Improvement of plant performance over a wide range of

operational conditions

Increasing flexibility

Design costs reduction

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 3. Applications of Intelligent Control

Intelligent system methods?

There are many methods that have proven useful in

Introduction to Intelligent Control

industrial applications. The main ones are:

Heuristic Construction of Nonlinear Controllers

Data-Based Nonlinear Estimation

Intelligent Adaptive Control Strategies

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 3. Applications of Intelligent Control

Heuristic Construction of Nonlinear Controllers

Methods are heuristic because they normally do not rely on the

Introduction to Intelligent Control

development and use of a mathematical and formal model of the

process to be controlled.

Two techniques of Intelligent Control have made most of the

contributions to this area: fuzzy control and expert systems for
control

Example: vibration damping in a flexible-link robot

Vibration suppression in flexible mechanical structures whose

parameters depend on the configuration can be extremely difficult to
achieve

Even if a relatively accurate model of the flexible robot can be

developed, it is often too complex to use in controller development

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 3. Applications of Intelligent Control

Heuristic Construction of Nonlinear Controllers

Conventional controller are developed either (1) via simple crude

Introduction to Intelligent Control

models of the plant behavior (e.g., from first principles or using system
identification methods) or (2) via the ad-hoc tuning of linear or nonlinear
controllers.

Fuzzy control has been shown to be quite successful for this

application compared to conventional control approaches.

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 3. Applications of Intelligent Control

Data-Based Nonlinear Estimation

Methods use neural networks to construct mappings from data,

Introduction to Intelligent Control

since they have been found to be quite useful in pattern

recognition and estimation.

Example: automotive engine failure estimation

An engine test cell is used to diagnostic faults

Measurements are taken of engine inputs and outputs for various

calibration faults.

Faults are induced over the whole range of possible values of

calibration faults.

Data from all these experiments becomes the training data set and
allows to construct neural estimators for calibration faults.

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 3. Applications of Intelligent Control

Intelligent Adaptive Control Strategies

Methods have very close relationships to the methods used in

Introduction to Intelligent Control

conventional adaptive control.

There are two general approaches to adaptive control: indirect

and direct adaptive control. In neural or fuzzy adaptive control
the controller is implemented with a neural or fuzzy system,
respectively.

Example: adaptive fuzzy control for ship steering

The fuzzy controller is updated (by tuning the output membership

function centers) when a learning mechanism observes a significant
error between the reference model output and the plant output.

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