Control Systems/Stability

1 Stability implies that

When a system is unstable, the output of the system may

be infinite even though the input to the system was finite. ∥y(t)∥ ≤ k
This causes a number of practical problems. For instance,
a robot arm controller that is unstable may cause the robot There are a number of different types of stability, and
to move dangerously. Also, systems that are unstable of- keywords that are used with the topic of stability. Some
ten incur a certain amount of physical damage, which can of the important words that we are going to be discussing
become costly. Nonetheless, many systems are inherently in this chapter, and the next few chapters are: BIBO
unstable - a fighter jet, for instance, or a rocket at liftoff, Stable, Marginally Stable, Conditionally Stable, Uni-
are examples of naturally unstable systems. Although we formly Stable, Asymptoticly Stable, and Unstable. All
can design controllers that stabilize the system, it is first of these words mean slightly different things.
important to understand what stability is, how it is deter-
mined, and why it matters.
The chapters in this section are heavily mathematical, 3 Determining BIBO Stability
and many require a background in linear differential
equations. Readers without a strong mathematical back- We can prove mathematically that a system f is BIBO
ground might want to review the necessary chapters in the stable if an arbitrary input x is bounded by two finite but
Calculus and Ordinary Differential Equations books (or large arbitrary constants M and -M:
equivalent) before reading this material.
For most of this chapter we will be assuming that the sys-
tem is linear, and can be represented either by a set of −M < x ≤ M
transfer functions or in state space. Linear systems have
an associated characteristic polynomial, and this polyno- We apply the input x, and the arbitrary boundaries M and
mial tells us a great deal about the stability of the system. -M to the system to produce three outputs:
Negativeness of any coefficient of a characteristic poly-
nomial indicates that the system is either unstable or at
most marginally stable. If any coefficient is zero/negative
yx = f (x)
then we can say that the system is unstable. It is important
to note, though, that even if all of the coefficients of the
yM = f (M )
characteristic polynomial are positive the system may still
be unstable. We will look into this in more detail below. y−M = f (−M )
Now, all three outputs should be finite for all possible val-
2 BIBO Stability ues of M and x, and they should satisfy the following re-
lationship:
A system is defined to be BIBO Stable if every bounded
input to the system results in a bounded output over the
time interval [t0 , ∞) . This must hold for all initial times y−M ≤ yx ≤ yM
tₒ. So long as we don't input infinity to our system, we
won't get infinity output. If this condition is satisfied, then the system is BIBO sta-
ble.
A system is defined to be uniformly BIBO Stable if
there exists a positive constant k that is independent of A SISO linear time-invariant (LTI) system is BIBO stable
t0 such that for all t0 the following conditions: if and only if g(t) is absolutely integrable from [0,∞] or
from:

∥u(t)∥ ≤ 1 ∫ ∞

t ≥ t0 |g(t)| dt ≤ M < ∞
0

1
2 6 TRANSFER FUNCTIONS REVISITED

3.1 Example real part and every transfer function in the transfer func-
tion matrix is not improper. For these systems, it is pos-
Consider the system: sible to use the Routh-Hurwitz, Root Locus, and Nyquist
methods described later, but these methods must be per-
formed once for each individual transfer function in the
2 transfer function matrix.
h(t) =
t
We can apply our test, selecting an arbitrarily large finite
constant M, and an arbitrary input x such that -M < x < 5 Poles and Eigenvalues
M.
Note:
As M approaches infinity (but does not reach infinity), we
Every pole of G(s) is an eigenvalue of the system matrix
can show that:
A. However, not every eigenvalue of A is a pole of G(s).

2 The poles of the transfer function, and the eigenvalues of

y−M = lim = 0−
M →∞ −M the system matrix A are related. In fact, we can say that
the eigenvalues of the system matrix A are the poles of the
And: transfer function of the system. In this way, if we have the
eigenvalues of a system in the state-space domain, we can
use the Routh-Hurwitz, and Root Locus methods as if we
2 had our system represented by a transfer function instead.
yM = lim = 0+
M →∞ M
On a related note, eigenvalues and all methods and mathe-
So now, we can write out our inequality: matical techniques that use eigenvalues to determine sys-
tem stability only work with time-invariant systems. In
systems which are time-variant, the methods using eigen-
y−M ≤ yx ≤ yM values to determine system stability fail.

0− ≤ x < 0+
And this inequality should be satisfied for all possible val-
6 Transfer Functions Revisited
ues of x. However, we can see that when x is zero, we
have the following: We are going to have a brief refesher here about transfer
functions, because several of the later chapters will use
transfer functions for analyzing system stability.
2 Let us remember our generalized feedback-loop transfer
yx = lim = ∞
x→0 x function, with a gain element of K, a forward path Gp(s),
Which means that x is between -M and M, but the value and a feedback of Gb(s). We write the transfer function
yₓ is not between y-M and yM. Therefore, this system is for this system as:
not stable.
KGp(s)
Hcl (s) =
1 + Hol (s)
4 Poles and Stability
Where Hcl is the closed-loop transfer function, and Hol
is the open-loop transfer function. Again, we define the
When the poles of the closed-loop transfer function of a open-loop transfer function as the product of the forward
given system are located in the right-half of the S-plane path and the feedback elements, as such:
(RHP), the system becomes unstable. When the poles of
the system are located in the left-half plane (LHP) and the
system is not improper, the system is shown to be stable. H (s) = KGp(s)Gb(s)
ol
A number of tests deal with this particular facet of stabil-
ity: The Routh-Hurwitz Criteria, the Root-Locus, and Now, we can define F(s) to be the characteristic equa-
the Nyquist Stability Criteria all test whether there are tion. F(s) is simply the denominator of the closed-loop
poles of the transfer function in the RHP. We will learn transfer function, and can be defined as such:
about all these tests in the upcoming chapters. [Characteristic Equation]
If the system is a multivariable, or a MIMO system, then
the system is stable if and only if every pole of every trans-
fer function in the transfer function matrix has a negative F (s) = 1 + Hol = D(s)
 3

We can say conclusively that the roots of the characteristic

equation are the poles of the transfer function. Now, we
know a few simple facts:

1. The locations of the poles of the closed-loop transfer

function determine if the system is stable or not
2. The zeros of the characteristic equation are the poles
of the closed-loop transfer function.
3. The characteristic equation is always a simpler equa-
tion than the closed-loop transfer function.

These functions combined show us that we can focus our

attention on the characteristic equation, and find the roots
of that equation.

7 State-Space and Stability

As we have discussed earlier, the system is stable if the
eigenvalues of the system matrix A have negative real
parts. However, there are other stability issues that we
can analyze, such as whether a system is uniformly sta-
ble, asymptotically stable, or otherwise. We will discuss
all these topics in a later chapter.

8 Marginal Stablity
When the poles of the system in the complex S-Domain
exist on the complex frequency axis (the vertical axis), or
when the eigenvalues of the system matrix are imaginary
(no real part), the system exhibits oscillatory character-
istics, and is said to be marginally stable. A marginally
stable system may become unstable under certain circum-
stances, and may be perfectly stable under other circum-
stances. It is impossible to tell by inspection whether a
marginally stable system will become unstable or not.
We will discuss marginal stability more in the following
chapters.
4 9 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

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