EurAsia-ICT 2002, Shiraz-Iran, 29-31 Oct.

Internal Stability of the Standard Control System 1

Vladimír Kučera
Faculty of Electrical Engineering
Czech Technical University in Prague
Czech republic
kucera@feld.cvut.cz

Abstract signal y is the vector of measured variables and u is the

vector of control inputs.
The paper studies stabilizability of the standard
control system (Figure 1) that comprises a linear plant
and a linear controller described by rational transfer
matrices. In a tutorial presentation, input-output stability
is defined as system’s ability to preserve the input and w z
output signal space. It is observed that input-output stable
linear systems have transfer matrices whose elements all
G
belong to RH∞ , the space of rational functions analytic in
the closed right half of the complex plane and at infinity.
The standard control system is said to be internally u y
stable if the subsystems defined by any pair of input and
output terminals within the system all are input-output K
stable. For a given plant, a necessary and sufficient
condition is established for achieving internal stability of
the standard control system. This condition is expressed in
Figure 1. Standard control system
terms of either left or right coprime factors over RH∞ of
the plant transfer matrix.
The stabilizability condition can be given a system-
theoretic interpretation: the fixed poles of the plant must It is assumed that the plant and the controller are
be located within the open left half of the complex plane. linear, multi-input, multi-output, finite-dimensional, and
This result makes it possible to obtain a parametrization time-invariant systems. Accordingly, it is assumed that the
of all controllers that internally stabilize the standard signals are vectors whose components are piecewise-
control system with a given plant. The importance of continuous functions from R+ to R. For a fixed real
internally stable control systems derives from the absence number p ∈ [1, ∞), let Rp denote the set of piecewise-
of impulsive as well as non-decaying exponential modes. continuous functions whose p-th powers are absolutely
Riemann integrable over R+, while R∞ denotes the set of
piecewise-continuous functions that are bounded over R+.
The spaces of vector-valued functions with n components
1. Standard control system are denoted Rpn.
Consider an interconnected system of the form shown
in Figure 1. In this system, G is the plant and K is the
controller. The plant accounts for all system components 2. Input-output stability
except for the controller. The signal w incorporates all
external inputs, including disturbances, sensor noise, and Consider a finite-dimensional, time-invariant, and linear
commands. The output z contains all controlled variables, system with an m-vector input w and an l-vector output z,
including production outputs and tracking errors. The described by the input-output relationship

1
Supported by the Ministry of Education of the Czech Republic under Research Program MSM 212300013

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 t 4. Existence of stabilizing controllers
z( t ) = ∫ f ( t − τ )w( τ )dτ
0 This section presents a necessary and sufficient
condition for achieving internal stability of the standard
where f is the impulse response matrix. The elements of f control system shown in Figure 1.
are Laplace-transformable functions from R+ to R and the In terms of Laplace transforms, the input-output
Laplace transform F ( s ) of f, the system transfer matrix, relationship of the plant G reads
is a rational matrix in s. Then the system is said to be Rp-
stable if w ∈ Rpm implies z ∈ Rpl. Thus, an Rp-stable  z   G11 G12   w
system preserves Rp as the signal space.  y  = G G 22   u 
   21
The symbol RH∞ will be used to denote the set of
proper rational functions whose poles all have negative and that of the controller
real parts. It is well known [6] that a system with a
rational transfer matrix F is Rp-stable for all p ∈ [1, ∞] if u=Ky
and only if F ∈ RH∞. According to this result, a necessary where all the transfer matrices are rational.
and sufficient condition for a system with a rational Since input-output stability is equivalent to system
transfer matrix to have any one of the various forms of transfer matrices having all elements in RH∞, it is helpful
input-output stability is that the transfer matrix belongs to to factorize any rational transfer matrix, say F, as
RH∞.
−1
F = D −1 N = N D
3. Internal stability
where D, N as well as D, N are RH∞ matrices. It is natural
The aim of the paper is to study internal stability of the
standard control system configuration, based on the notion to require that D and N be left coprime, that is, there exist
of input-output stability. To this end, consider the standard two matrices P, Q also with elements in RH∞ such that
control system and inject exogenous inputs v1 and v2
around the loop as shown in Figure 2. Thus the triple v1,
v2, w represents all independent input signals to the DP + NQ = I ,
standard control system.
the identity. Likewise D and N are required to be right
coprime, in the sense that there exist two matrices P, Q
with elements in RH∞ such that
w z
G DP + NQ = I .
v2 x2
Clearly all the left RH∞ matrix factors common to D and
u N, as well as all the right RH∞ matrix factors common to
y D and N , are unimodular, that is, invertible RH∞
matrices whose inverses are also RH∞ matrices.
K Accordingly, let
x1 v1
[ G 21 G 22 ] = D 22
−1
[ N 21 N 22 ]

Figure 2. External and internal signals be a left coprime factorization over RH∞ and

 G12   N 12  −1
The standard control system is said to be internally G  =   D 22
stable if the nine transfer matrices from v1, v2, w to the  22   N 22 
internal signals x1, x2, z are matrices whose elements all
belong to RH∞. As a consequence, if the exogenous inputs be a right coprime factorization over RH∞. Then left and
are in Rp, so too are x1, x2, z and hence u, y. So internal right coprime factors over RH∞ of the plant transfer matrix
stability guarantees internal signals in Rp for all p ∈ [1, ∞]. have the form

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 −1 X
 D11 D12   N 11 N 12   G11 G12  − N 22 
 0 = =  
 D 22  N
 21 N 22  G 21 G 22  − Y D 22 

 N 11
= 
 N 21
where, notably, the denominator factors are block
triangular. Likewise, for the controller,
−1
X −1Y = Y X .
Theorem 1. Given a plant G, there exists a controller
K that internally stabilizes the standard control system of
Figure 1 if, and only if, either of the following two
conditions is satisfied:
(a) D11 is unimodular, D22 and N 22 are left coprime;
(b) D 11 is unimodular, D 22 and N 22 are left coprime.
−1
N 12   D 11 0  are unimodular. Since X and Y are right coprime, the
 
N 22   D 21 D 22  latter matrix is unimodular if and only if D 22 and N 22 are
right coprime. This proves (b).
The stabilizability conditions of Theorem 1 can be
given a nice system-theoretic interpretation. As long as
−1 −1
D 22 N 22 = G 22 = N 22 D 22
are coprime factorizations, the zeros of D22 are equal to
the zeros of D 22 and both are equal to the poles of G22 .
Then, requiring D11 or D 11 to be unimodular means
requiring G to have no poles in the closed right half-plane
Re s ≥ 0 nor at the point s = ∞ other than those of G22 . In

Proof: The nine transfer matrices defined in Figure 2 can fact, the zeros of D11 (equivalently, D 11 ) are the fixed
be written in terms of left coprime factors over RH∞ as poles of the plant; no controller can relocate them.
Correspondingly, they are constrained to lie within the
−1 open left half of the complex plane. Similar results and
 z   D11 D12 − N 12   N 11 D12 0w interpretations are reported in [2], [3], and [4].
x  =  0 D 22 − N 22  N D 22 0   v1 
 1   21
 x 2   0 −Y X   0 0 X  v 2 
5. Parametrization of stabilizing controllers
These transfer matrices are all RH∞ matrices if and only if In view of the conditions of Theorem 1, a controller
the RH∞ matrix to be inverted is unimodular. This is the K will internally stabilize G if it internally stabilizes G22.
case if and only if both D11 and Applying the standard result [1], [5] one obtains the
parametrization of all stabilizing controllers for the
 D 22 − N 22  standard control system.
 −Y Suppose the conditions of Theorem 1 are satisfied. Let
 X 
X, Y and X , Y be four matrices with elements in RH∞
satisfying the Bézout identity
are unimodular. Since X and Y are left coprime the latter
matrix is unimodular if and only if D22 and N 22 are left
coprime. This proves (a).  D 22 − N 22   X N 22   I 0
 −Y  = .
Likewise, in terms of right coprime factors over RH∞,  X   Y D 22  0 I 

−1
z  N 11 0 N 12   D11 0 0  w Then the set of all controllers for which the standard
  =     
 x1   0 X 0  − N 21 X − N 22   v1  control system shown in Figure 1 is internally stable
 x2   D 21 0 D 22   D 21 − Y D 22  v2  equals

K = ( X + WN 22 ) −1 (Y + WD22 )
These matrices are all RH∞ matrices if and only if the RH∞
= (Y + D 22W )( X + N 22W ) −1
matrix to be inverted is unimodular. This is the case if and
only if both D 11 and
where W is a matrix whose elements range over RH∞ and
such that X + WN 22 and X + N 22W are nonsingular.

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 The parameter matrix W is free; the two nonsingularity
constraints rule out at most one value of W each.
The importance of the notion of internal stability
derives in part from the fact that an internally stable
control system is devoid of impulsive in addition to non-
decaying exponential modes.
6. References
[1] V. Kučera, Discrete Linear Control: The Polynomial
Equation Approach, Wiley, Chichester, 1979.
[2] V. Kučera, V. “A tutorial on the H2 control theory:
The continuous time case”, in: M.J. Grimble and V.
Kučera (eds), Polynomial Methods in Control Systems
Design, pp. 1-55, Springer, London, 1996.
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[3] H. Kwakernaak, “H2 optimization – Theory and
applications to robust control design”, in: V. Kučera and
M. Šebek (eds), Robust Control Design, A Proceedings
Volume from the 3rd IFAC Symposium, Prague, Czech
Republic, pp. 437-448, Pergamon, Oxford, 2000.
[4] G. Meinsma, “On the standard H2 problem”, in: V.
Kučera and M. Šebek (eds), Robust Control Design, A
Proceedings Volume from the 3rd IFAC Symposium,
Prague, Czech Republic, pp. 681-686, Pergamon, Oxford,
2000.
[5] M. Vidyasagar, Control System Synthesis: A
Factorization Approach, MIT Press, Cambridge, 1986.
[6] M. Vidyasagar, Nonlinear Systems Analysis, Prentice
Hall, Englewood Cliffs, 1993.