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For a class of nontriangular nonlinear systems in presence of unknown disturbances, we propose a predictor-based neural dynamic surface control (PNDSC) strategy in this paper. This nontriangular system is transformed via the mean value theorem, and a predictor is then constructed. To avoid an algebraic loop problem, partial state vectors are employed as input signals of neural networks (NNs) for approximating unknown dynamics, and compensation items are designed to compensate for approximation errors from NNs. Different from the traditional NDSC, the PNDSC in this paper utilizes prediction errors to update learning parameters for improving NNs’ learning behaviors with overlarge adaptive gains. On the basis of improved NNs’ approximation behaviors, a predictor-based NNs disturbance observer (PNNDO) is constructed for compensation for external disturbances and approximation errors from NNs. Furthermore, with predictors, a normalization method of weights is developed to reduce the number of online learning parameters. On the basis of the aforementioned result, measurement noises are taken into account in our predictor-based neural control strategy. We employ predictor states, rather than measurement information paralyzed by noises, in design of our control strategy. This reduces high-frequency oscillations in control input. A Lyapunov-based stability analysis shows that all signals are ultimately bounded in the closed-loop system. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy is verified by a numerical example and a permanent magnet brushless DC motor system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the observer based neural adaptive finite-time containment control strategy for non-strict feedback nonlinear multi-agent systems is studied. The finite-time command filter is used to overcome the explosion of complexity problem and the established fractional power based error compensation signal is applied to compensate the filtering error caused by the filter. The distributed finite-time command filtered backstepping control method combines with the neural adaptive control technology and state observer is given, which ensures the containment control errors reach to the desired neighborhood of the origin in finite-time in the presence of uncertain dynamics and unmeasurable states in the system. The given numerical simulations show the effectiveness of the proposed control strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the secure consensus tracking problem for continuous-time nonlinear multiagent systems with sensor attacks. By designing a secure data selector, the unattacked output data is extracted from a group of output measurements under sparse sensor attacks. Then, by virtue of the obtained data and neural networks, a state observer is constructed to estimate the unavailable system states, where the convex combination theory is introduced to reduce the difficulty of solving observation gains. To utilize the limited communication resources reasonably, a novel saturated threshold event-triggered control strategy is proposed to reduce control updates, and then each update is encoded into a binary signal (0 or 1) to further reduce the occupation of communication bandwidth. The designed control scheme ensures that all closed-loop signals are semi-globally uniformly ultimately bounded, and its effectiveness is verified via a simulation of attitude control of unmanned aerial vehicles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, an adaptive admittance control scheme is developed for robots to interact with time-varying environments. Admittance control is adopted to achieve a compliant physical robot–environment interaction, and the uncertain environment with time-varying dynamics is defined as a linear system. A critic learning method is used to obtain the desired admittance parameters based on the cost function composed of interaction force and trajectory tracking without the knowledge of the environmental dynamics. To deal with dynamic uncertainties in the control system, a neural-network (NN)-based adaptive controller with a dynamic learning framework is developed to guarantee the trajectory tracking performance. Experiments are conducted and the results have verified the effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies an adaptive neural network (NN) tracking control method for a class of uncertain nonlinear strict-feedback systems with time-varying full-state constraints. As we all know, the states are inevitably constrained in the actual systems because of the safety and performance factors. The main contributions of this paper are that: 1) in order to ensure that the states do not violate the asymmetric time-varying constraint regions, an adaptive NN controller is constructed by introducing the asymmetric time-varying barrier Lyapunov function (TVBLF) and 2) the amount of the learning parameters is reduced by introducing a TVBLF at each step of the backstepping. Based on the Lyapunov stability analysis, it can be proven that all the signals in the closed-loop system are the semiglobal ultimately uniformly bounded and the time-varying full-state constraints are never violated. Finally, a numerical simulation is given, and the effectiveness of this adaptive control method can be verified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the adaptive neural network (NN) tracking control problem is addressed for robot manipulators subject to dead-zone input. The control objective is to design an adaptive NN controller to guarantee the stability of the systems and obtain good performance. Different from the existing results, which used NN to approximate the nonlinearities directly, NNs are employed to identify the originally designed virtual control signals with unknown nonlinear items in this paper. Moreover, a sequence of virtual control signals and real controller are designed. The adaptive backstepping control method and Lyapunov stability theory are used to prove the proposed controller can ensure all the signals in the systems are semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded, and the output of the systems can track the reference signal closely. Finally, the proposed adaptive control strategy is applied to the Puma 560 robot manipulator to demonstrate its effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the receding horizon near-optimal tracking control problem about a class of continuous-time nonlinear systems with fully unknown dynamics is considered. The main challenges of this problem lie in two aspects: 1) most existing systems only restrict their considerations to the state feedback part while the input channel parameters are assumed to be known. This paper considers fully unknown system dynamics in both the state feedback channel and the input channel and 2) the optimal control of nonlinear systems requires the solution of nonlinear Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman equations. Up to date, there are no systematic approaches in the existing literature to solve it accurately. A novel model-free adaptive near-optimal control method is proposed to solve this problem via utilizing the Taylor expansion-based problem relaxation, the universal approximation property of sigmoid neural networks, and the concept of sliding mode control. By making approximation for the performance index, it is first relaxed to a quadratic program, and then, a linear algebraic equation with unknown terms. An auxiliary system is designed to reconstruct the input-to-output property of the control systems with unknown dynamics, so as to tackle the difficulty caused by the unknown terms. Then, by considering the property of the sliding-mode surface, an explicit adaptive near-optimal control law is derived from the linear algebraic equation. Theoretical analysis shows that the auxiliary system is convergent, the resultant closed-loop system is asymptotically stable, and the performance index asymptomatically converges to optimal. An illustrative example and experimental results are presented, which substantiate the efficacy of the proposed method and verify the theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to analyze the problem of adaptive neural network (NN) tracking control for a class of switched stochastic nonlinear pure-feedback systems with unknown direction hysteresis. In the light of recent studies on the hysteresis phenomenon in the field of nonlinear switched systems, this paper focuses on Bouc–Wen hysteresis model with unknown parameters and direction conditions. To simplify the control design, the following procedure is applied. Prior to tackling the unknown direction hysteresis problem based on the Nussbaum function and the backstepping techniques, the pure-feedback structure difficulty is governed by the mean value theorem. Furthermore, an optimized adaptation method is utilized to cope with computational burden. Universal approximation capability of radial basis function NNs and Lyapunov function method is synthesized to develop an adaptive NN tracking control scheme. It is demonstrated that under arbitrary deterministic switching, the presented controller can guarantee that all signals in the closed-loop system are semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded in probability and the tracking error converges to a neighborhood of the origin. Finally, two simulation examples are given to illustrate the advantages of the proposed control design approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the problem of adaptive exponential synchronization in mean square for a new neural network model with the following features: 1) the noise is characterized by the Lévy process and the parameters of the model change in line with the Markovian process; 2) the master system is also disturbed by the same Lévy noise; and 3) there are multiple slave systems, and the state matrix of each slave system is an affine function of the state matrices of all slave systems. Based on the Lyapunov functional theory, the generalized Itô’s formula, $M$ -matrix method, and the adaptive control technique, some criteria are established to ensure the adaptive exponential synchronization in the mean square of the master system and each slave system. Moreover, the update law of the control gain and the dynamic variation of the parameters of the slave systems are provided. Finally, the effectiveness of the synchronization criteria proposed in this paper is verified by a practical example. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, an event-based distributed cooperative learning (DCL) law is proposed for a group of adaptive neural control systems. The plants to be controlled have identical structures, but reference signals for each plant are different. During control process, each agent intermittently broadcasts its neural network (NN) weight estimation to its neighboring agents under an event-triggered condition that is only based on its own estimated NN weights. If communication topology is connected and undirected, the NN weights of all neural control systems can converge to a small neighborhood of their optimal values. The generalization ability of NNs is guaranteed in the event-triggered context, that is, the approximation domain of each NN is the union of all system trajectories. Furthermore, a strictly positive lower bound on the interevent intervals is also guaranteed to avoid the Zeno behavior. Finally, a numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed learning law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concerns the adaptive state-feedback control for a class of high-order stochastic nonlinear systems with uncertainties including time-varying delay, unknown control gain, and parameter perturbation. The commonly used growth assumptions on system nonlinearities are removed, and the adaptive control technique is combined with the sign function to deal with the unknown control gain. Then, with the help of the radial basis function neural network approximation approach and Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional, an adaptive state-feedback controller is obtained through the backstepping design procedure. It is verified that the constructed controller can render the closed-loop system semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded. Finally, both the practical and numerical examples are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the consensus problem is investigated for a class of nonaffine nonlinear multiagent systems (MASs) with actuator faults of partial loss of effectiveness fault and biased fault. To deal with the control difficulty caused by the nonaffine dynamics, a neural network (NN)-based adaptive consensus protocol is developed based on the Lyapunov analysis. The neuron input of the NN uses both the state information and the consensus error information. In addition, the negative feedback term of the NN weight update law is multiplied by an absolute value of the consensus error, which is helpful in improving the consensus accuracy. With the developed adaptive NN consensus protocol, semiglobal consensus with a bounded residual consensus error of the MAS is achieved, and the bounded NN weight matrix is guaranteed. Finally, simulation results show that the developed adaptive NN consensus protocol has advantages of fast convergence rate and good consensus accuracy and has the capability of rapid response with respect to the actuator faults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a novel adaptive control methodology based on the admittance model for multiple manipulators transporting a rigid object cooperatively along a predefined desired trajectory. First, an admittance model is creatively applied to generate reference trajectory online for each manipulator according to the desired path of the rigid object, which is the reference input of the controller. Then, an innovative integral barrier Lyapunov function is utilized to tackle the constraints due to the physical and environmental limits. Adaptive neural networks (NNs) are also employed to approximate the uncertainties of the manipulator dynamics. Different from the conventional NN approximation method, which is usually semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded, a switching function is presented to guarantee the global stability of the closed loop. Finally, the simulation studies are conducted on planar two-link robot manipulators to validate the efficacy of the proposed approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents adaptive neural tracking control of underactuated surface vessels with modeling uncertainties and time-varying external disturbances, where the tracking errors consisting of position and orientation errors are required to keep inside their predefined feasible regions in which the controller singularity problem does not happen. To provide the preselected specifications on the transient and steady-state performances of the tracking errors, the boundary functions of the predefined regions are taken as exponentially decaying functions of time. The unknown external disturbances are estimated by disturbance observers and then are compensated in the feedforward control loop to improve the robustness against the disturbances. Based on the dynamic surface control technique, backstepping procedure, logarithmic barrier functions, and control Lyapunov synthesis, singularity-free controllers are presented to guarantee the satisfaction of predefined performance requirements. In addition to the nominal case when the accurate model of a marine vessel is known a priori, the modeling uncertainties in the form of unknown nonlinear functions are also discussed. Adaptive neural control with the compensations of modeling uncertainties and external disturbances is developed to achieve the boundedness of the signals in the closed-loop system with guaranteed transient and steady-state tracking performances. Simulation results show the performance of the vessel control systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents an adaptive neural network (NN) control of a two-degree-of-freedom manipulator driven by an electrohydraulic actuator. To restrict the system output in a prescribed performance constraint, a weighted performance function is designed to guarantee the dynamic and steady tracking errors of joint angle in a required accuracy. Then, a radial-basis-function NN is constructed to train the unknown model dynamics of a manipulator by traditional backstepping control (TBC) and obtain the preliminary estimated model, which can replace the preknown dynamics in the backstepping iteration. Furthermore, an adaptive estimation law is adopted to self-tune every trained-node weight, and the estimated model is online optimized to enhance the robustness of the NN controller. The effectiveness of the proposed control is verified by comparative simulation and experimental results with Proportional–integral-derivative and TBC methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the uncertain direct of the hysteretic system component will be considered. Besides, the effect of stochastic disturbance inevitably exists in many practical systems, which would cause the instability. Simultaneously, it is significant to guarantee the perfect error tracking performance for the uncertain nonlinear hysteresis systems when operation suffers the failure. To ensure the maintaining acceptable system performance in reality, the new properties of the Nussbaum function are proposed, and an auxiliary virtual controller is designed through the neural network (NN) universal approximator. Furthermore, it is challenged to save the system-limited transmutation resource for nonlinear systems, especially for stochastic nonlinear systems, with unknown hysteresis input and actuator failures. The coupling effect of the system communication resource constrains has to arise the issue of the mutual coupling function, which makes that the tracking control design is more complicated. Using the proposed event-triggered controller and back-stepping technology, a new optimization algorithm is proposed to ensure that the states of the closed-loop system and the tracking error remain bounded in probability. Finally, to illustrate the effectiveness of our proposed adaptive NN control method with the event-triggered strategy, some numerical examples are provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes an adaptive neural control method for a class of nonlinear time-varying delayed systems with time-varying full-state constraints. To address the problems of the time-varying full-state constraints and time-varying delays in a unified framework, an adaptive neural control method is investigated for the first time. The problems of time delay and constraint are the main factors of limiting the system performance severely and even cause system instability. The effect of unknown time-varying delays is eliminated by using appropriate Lyapunov–Krasovskii functionals. In addition, the constant constraint is the only special case of time-varying constraint which leads to more complex and difficult tasks. To guarantee the full state always within the time-varying constrained interval, the time-varying asymmetric barrier Lyapunov function is employed. Finally, two simulation examples are given to confirm the effectiveness of the presented control scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new study on the adaptive neural network-based control of a class of noncanonical nonlinear systems with large parametric uncertainties. Unlike commonly studied canonical form nonlinear systems whose neural network approximation system models have explicit relative degree structures, which can directly be used to derive parameterized controllers for adaptation, noncanonical form nonlinear systems usually do not have explicit relative degrees, and thus their approximation system models are also in noncanonical forms. It is well-known that the adaptive control of noncanonical form nonlinear systems involves the parameterization of system dynamics. As demonstrated in this paper, it is also the case for noncanonical neural network approximation system models. Effective control of such systems is an open research problem, especially in the presence of uncertain parameters. This paper shows that it is necessary to reparameterize such neural network system models for adaptive control design, and that such reparameterization can be realized using a relative degree formulation, a concept yet to be studied for general neural network system models. This paper then derives the parameterized controllers that guarantee closed-loop stability and asymptotic output tracking for noncanonical form neural network system models. An illustrative example is presented with the simulation results to demonstrate the control design procedure, and to verify the effectiveness of such a new design method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the position and attitude tracking control problem of a quadrotor unmanned aerial vehicle subject to modeling uncertainties and actuator failures. A comprehensive mathematical model reflecting the nonlinearity and state-space coupling of the dynamics as well as actuation faults and external disturbances is derived. By combining the radial basis function neural networks (NNs) with virtual parameter estimating algorithms, an indirect NN-based adaptive fault-tolerant control scheme is developed, which exhibits several attractive features as compared with most existing methods: 1) it is not only robust and adaptive to nonparametric uncertainties but also tolerant to unexpected actuation faults; 2) it ensures stable tracking without the need for precise information on system model; and 3) it only involves one lumped parameter adaptation, thus is structurally simpler and computationally less expensive, rendering the resultant scheme less demanding in programming and more affordable for onboard implementation. The effectiveness and benefits of the proposed method are confirmed via computer simulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, an adaptive neural control design method is presented for a class of multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) pure-feedback nonlinear systems with periodically time-varying disturbances appearing nonlinearly in unknown nonaffine functions. The nonaffine functions do not need to be differentiable, and the bounded condition of unknown nonaffine functions is relaxed such that only a more general semibounded assumption is required as the controllability condition of the considered MIMO pure-feedback system. To facilitate the control design, the gain functions are designed to be continuous and positive with the bounds being unknown functions. Furthermore, for handling with the difficulty caused by these unknown bounds, several appropriate compact sets are defined to obtain the bounds of gain functions. By utilizing Lyapunov analysis, all the variables of the resulting closed-loop system are proven to be semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded, and the tracking error can converge to an arbitrarily small neighborhood around zero by choosing design parameters appropriately. The effectiveness of the proposed control algorithm is demonstrated by two simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the tracking synchronization problem for a class of coupled reaction–diffusion neural networks (CRDNNs) with undirected topology. For the case where the tracking trajectory has identical individual dynamic as that of the network nodes, the edge-based and vertex-based adaptive strategies on coupling strengths as well as adaptive controllers, which demand merely the local neighbor information, are proposed to synchronize the CRDNNs to the tracking trajectory. To reduce the control costs, an adaptive pinning control technique is employed. For the case where the tracking trajectory has different individual dynamic from that of the network nodes, the vertex-based adaptive strategy is proposed to drive the synchronization error to a relatively small area, which is adjustable according to the parameters of the adaptive strategy. This kind of adaptive design can enhance the robustness of the network against the external disturbance posed on the tracking trajectory. The obtained theoretical results are verified by two representative examples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses the control design for an upper limb exoskeleton in the presence of input saturation. An adaptive controller employing the neural network technology is proposed to approximate the uncertain robotic dynamics. Also, an auxiliary system is designed to deal with the effect of input saturation. Furthermore, we develop both the state feedback and the output feedback control strategies, which effectively estimates the uncertainties online from the measured feedback errors, instead of the model-based control. In addition to the proposed control, a disturbance observer is designed to reject the unknown disturbance online for achieving the trajectory tracking. The method requires a minimal amount of a priori knowledge of system dynamics. Subsequently, the principle of Lyapunov synthesis ensures the stability of the closed-loop system. Finally, the experimental studies are carried out on this robotic exoskeleton. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the dynamical multisynchronization and static multisynchronization problem for delayed coupled multistable neural networks with fixed and switching topologies. To begin with, a class of activation functions as well as several sufficient conditions are introduced to ensure that every subnetwork has multiple equilibrium states. By constructing an appropriate Lyapunov function and by employing impulsive control theory and the average impulsive interval method, several sufficient conditions for multisynchronization in terms of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) are obtained. Moreover, a unified impulsive controller is designed by means of the established LMIs. Finally, a numerical example is presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the presented impulsive control strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the synchronization analysis and control problems for a class of nonlinear discrete-time stochastic complex dynamical networks (CDNs) consisting of identical nodes. The discrete-time stochastic dynamical networks under consideration are quite general that account for asymmetric coupling configuration, nonlinear inner coupling structures as well as nonidentical exogenous disturbances. By resorting to both the error bound and the synchronization probability, a notion ofquasi-synchronization in probabilityis first introduced to assess the synchronization performance of the addressed CDNs. An event-triggered pinning feedback control strategy is adopted to control a small fraction of the network nodes with hope to reduce the frequency of updating and communication in the control process while preserving the desired dynamical behaviors of the controlled networks. By using the Lyapunov function method and the stochastic analysis techniques, a general framework is established within which the problems of dynamics analysis and controller synthesis are solved for the closed-loop stochastic dynamical networks. Two numerical examples and their simulations are presented to illustrate the effectiveness and the usefulness of our theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on the problem of adaptive output-constrained neural tracking control for uncertain nonstrict-feedback systems in the presence of unknown symmetric output dead zone and input saturation. A Nussbaum-type function-based dead-zone model is introduced such that the dynamic surface control approach can be used for controller design. The variable separation technique is employed to decompose the unknown function of entire states in each subsystem into a series of smooth functions. Radial basis function neural networks are utilized to approximate the unknown black-box functions derived from Young’s inequality. With the help of auxiliary first-order filters, the dimensions of neural network input are reduced in each recursive design. A main advantage of the proposed method is that for an $n$ -order nonlinear system, only one adaptation parameter needs to be tuned online. It is rigorously shown that the proposed output-constrained controller guarantees that all the closed-loop signals are semiglobal uniformly ultimately bounded and the tracking error never violates the output constraint. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a stochastic gradient descent (SGD)-based adaptive neural network (NN) control scheme is presented for a class of uncertain nonlinear systems. The introduction of the SGD algorithm results in a better tracking performance compared with some other adaptive NN methods without using SGD. This is because the proposed SGD-based adaptive NN control strategy provides optimization algorithms for the weights, the widths, and the centers of the NNs, which can achieve a good function approximation performance. In order to implement the proposed method, extended differentiators are introduced to get the differential estimations of error signals, such that the loss function of the optimization algorithm can be constructed approximatively. Moreover, adaptive laws are designed to reduce the overall approximation errors, such that the tracking performance is further improved. By using the Lyapunov stability theory, it can be proved that the target signal is tracked by the system output within a small error. Finally, simulation and comparison results are given to show the effectiveness and advantages of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the neural-network-based adaptive control problem for a class of continuous-time nonlinear systems with actuator faults and external disturbances. The model uncertainties in the system are not required to satisfy the norm-bounded assumption, and the exact information for components faults and external disturbance is totally unknown, which represents more general cases in practical systems. An indirect adaptive backstepping control strategy is proposed to cope with the stabilization problem, where the unknown nonlinearity is approximated by the adaptive neural-network scheme, and the loss of effectiveness of actuators faults and the norm bounds of exogenous disturbances are estimated via designed online adaptive updating laws. The developed adaptive backstepping control law can ensure the asymptotic stability of the fault closed-loop system despite of unknown nonlinear function, actuator faults, and disturbances. Finally, an application example based on spacecraft attitude regulation is provided to demonstrate the effectiveness and the potential of the developed new neural adaptive control approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the problem of finite-time drive-response synchronization for a class of neural networks with discontinuous activations, time-varying discrete and infinite-time distributed delays, and mismatched parameters. In order to cope with the difficulties induced by discontinuous activations, time delays, as well as mismatched parameters simultaneously, new 1-norm-based analytical techniques are developed. Both state feedback and adaptive controllers with and without the sign function are designed. Based on differential inclusion theory and Lyapunov functional method, several sufficient conditions on the finite-time synchronization are obtained. Our results show that the controllers with a sign function can reduce the conservativeness of control gains and the controllers without a sign function can overcome the chattering phenomenon. Numerical examples are given to show the effectiveness of the theoretical analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a tracking control methodology for a class of uncertain nonlinear systems subject to input saturation constraint and external disturbances. Unlike most previous approaches on saturated systems, which assumed affine nonlinear systems, in this paper, tracking control problem is solved for uncertain nonaffine nonlinear systems with input saturation. To deal with the saturation constraint, an auxiliary system is constructed and a modified tracking error is defined. Then, by employing implicit function theorem, mean value theorem, and modified tracking error, updating rules are derived based on the well-known back-propagation (BP) algorithm, which has been proven to be the most relevant updating rule to control problems. However, most of the previous approaches on BP algorithm suffer from lack of stability analysis. By injecting a damping term to the standard BP algorithm, uniformly ultimately boundedness of all the signals of the closed-loop system is ensured via Lyapunov’s direct method. Furthermore, the presented approach employs nonlinear in parameter neural networks. Hence, the proposed scheme is applicable to systems with higher degrees of nonlinearity. Using a high-gain observer to reconstruct the states of the system, an output feedback controller is also presented. Finally, the simulation results performed on a Duffing-Holmes chaotic system, a generalized pendulum-type system, and a numerical system are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the suggested state and output feedback control schemes. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper addresses the problem of adaptive neural output-feedback control for a class of special nonlinear systems with the hysteretic output mechanism and the unmeasured states. A modified Bouc–Wen model is first employed to capture the output hysteresis phenomenon in the design procedure. For its fusion with the neural networks and the Nussbaum-type function, two key lemmas are established using some extended properties of this model. To avoid the bad system performance caused by the output nonlinearity, a barrier Lyapunov function technique is introduced to guarantee the prescribed constraint of the tracking error. In addition, a robust filtering method is designed to cancel the restriction that all the system states require to be measured. Based on the Lyapunov synthesis, a new neural adaptive controller is constructed to guarantee the prescribed convergence of the tracking error and the semiglobal uniform ultimate boundedness of all the signals in the closed-loop system. Simulations are implemented to evaluate the performance of the proposed neural control algorithm in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, the neural tracking problem is addressed for a group of uncertain nonlinear systems where the system structures are identical but the reference signals are different. This paper focuses on studying the learning capability of neural networks (NNs) during the control process. First, we propose a novel control scheme called distributed cooperative learning (DCL) control scheme, by establishing the communication topology among adaptive laws of NN weights to share their learned knowledge online. It is further proved that if the communication topology is undirected and connected, all estimated weights of NNs can converge to small neighborhoods around their optimal values over a domain consisting of the union of all state orbits. Second, as a corollary it is shown that the conclusion on the deterministic learning still holds in the decentralized adaptive neural control scheme where, however, the estimated weights of NNs just converge to small neighborhoods of the optimal values along their own state orbits. Thus, the learned controllers obtained by DCL scheme have the better generalization capability than ones obtained by decentralized learning method. A simulation example is provided to verify the effectiveness and advantages of the control schemes proposed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper investigates the data-driven consensus tracking problem for multiagent systems with both fixed communication topology and switching topology by utilizing a distributed model free adaptive control (MFAC) method. Here, agent’s dynamics are described by unknown nonlinear systems and only a subset of followers can access the desired trajectory. The dynamical linearization technique is applied to each agent based on the pseudo partial derivative, and then, a distributed MFAC algorithm is proposed to ensure that all agents can track the desired trajectory. It is shown that the consensus error can be reduced for both time invariable and time varying desired trajectories. The main feature of this design is that consensus tracking can be achieved using only input–output data of each agent. The effectiveness of the proposed design is verified by simulation examples. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper is concerned with the adaptive event-triggered control problem of nonlinear continuous-time systems in strict-feedback form. By using the event-sampled neural network (NN) to approximate the unknown nonlinear function, an adaptive model and an associated event-triggered controller are designed by exploiting the backstepping method. In the proposed method, the feedback signals and the NN weights are aperiodically updated only when the event-triggered condition is violated. A positive lower bound on the minimum intersample time is guaranteed to avoid accumulation point. The closed-loop stability of the resulting nonlinear impulsive dynamical system is rigorously proved via Lyapunov analysis under an adaptive event sampling condition. In comparing with the traditional adaptive backstepping design with a fixed sample period, the event-triggered method samples the state and updates the NN weights only when it is necessary. Therefore, the number of transmissions can be significantly reduced. Finally, two simulation examples are presented to show the effectiveness of the proposed control method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, an adaptive sliding mode control system using a double loop recurrent neural network (DLRNN) structure is proposed for a class of nonlinear dynamic systems. A new three-layer RNN is proposed to approximate unknown dynamics with two different kinds of feedback loops where the firing weights and output signal calculated in the last step are stored and used as the feedback signals in each feedback loop. Since the new structure has combined the advantages of internal feedback NN and external feedback NN, it can acquire the internal state information while the output signal is also captured, thus the new designed DLRNN can achieve better approximation performance compared with the regular NNs without feedback loops or the regular RNNs with a single feedback loop. The new proposed DLRNN structure is employed in an equivalent controller to approximate the unknown nonlinear system dynamics, and the parameters of the DLRNN are updated online by adaptive laws to get favorable approximation performance. To investigate the effectiveness of the proposed controller, the designed adaptive sliding mode controller with the DLRNN is applied to a $z$ -axis microelectromechanical system gyroscope to control the vibrating dynamics of the proof mass. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed methodology can achieve good tracking property, and the comparisons of the approximation performance between radial basis function NN, RNN, and DLRNN show that the DLRNN can accurately estimate the unknown dynamics with a fast speed while the internal states of DLRNN are more stable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a pattern-based neural network (NN) control approach for a class of uncertain nonlinear systems. The approach consists of two phases of identification and another two phases of recognition and control. First, in the phase (i) of identification, adaptive NN controllers are designed to achieve closed-loop stability and tracking performance of nonlinear systems for different control situations, and the corresponding closed-loop control system dynamics are identified via deterministic learning. The identified control system dynamics are stored in constant radial basis function (RBF) NNs, and a set of constant NN controllers are constructed by using the obtained constant RBF networks. Second, in the phase (ii) of identification, when the plant is operated under different or abnormal conditions, the system dynamics under normal control are identified via deterministic learning. A bank of dynamical estimators is constructed for all the abnormal conditions and the learned knowledge is embedded in the estimators. Third, in the phase of recognition, when one identified control situation recurs, by using the constructed estimators, the recurred control situation will be rapidly recognized. Finally, in the phase of pattern-based control, based on the rapid recognition, the constant NN controller corresponding to the current control situation is selected, and both closed-loop stability and improved control performance can be achieved. The results presented show that the pattern-based control realizes a humanlike control process, and will provide a new framework for fast decision and control in dynamic environments. A simulation example is included to demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, an antisynchronization problem is considered for an array of linearly coupled reaction–diffusion neural networks with cooperative-competitive interactions and time-varying coupling delays. The interaction topology among the neural nodes is modeled by a multilayer signed graph. The state evolution of a neuron in each layer of the coupled neural network is described by a reaction–diffusion equation (RDE) with Dirichlet boundary conditions. Then, the collective dynamics of the multilayer neural network are modeled by coupled RDEs with both spatial diffusion coupling and state coupling. An edge-based adaptive antisynchronization strategy is proposed for each neural node to achieve antisynchronization by using only local information of neighboring nodes. Furthermore, when the activation functions of the neural nodes are unknown, a linearly parameterized adaptive antisynchronization strategy is also proposed. The convergence of the antisynchronization errors of the nodes is analyzed by using a Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional method and a structural balance condition. Finally, some numerical simulations are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed antisynchronization strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, an adaptive controller is developed for a class of multi-input and multioutput nonlinear systems with neural networks (NNs) used as a modeling tool. It is shown that all the signals in the closed-loop system with the proposed adaptive neural controller are globally uniformly bounded for any external input in L[0,\infty ] . In our control design, the upper bound of the NN modeling error and the gains of external disturbance are characterized by unknown upper bounds, which is more rational to establish the stability in the adaptive NN control. Filter-based modification terms are used in the update laws of unknown parameters to improve the transient performance. Finally, fault-tolerant control is developed to accommodate actuator failure. An illustrative example applying the adaptive controller to control a rigid robot arm shows the validation of the proposed controller. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents the design of a complex-valued differential neural network identifier for uncertain nonlinear systems defined in the complex domain. This design includes the construction of an adaptive algorithm to adjust the parameters included in the identifier. The algorithm is obtained based on a special class of controlled Lyapunov functions. The quality of the identification process is characterized using the practical stability framework. Indeed, the region where the identification error converges is derived by the same Lyapunov method. This zone is defined by the power of uncertainties and perturbations affecting the complex-valued uncertain dynamics. Moreover, this convergence zone is reduced to its lowest possible value using ideas related to the so-called ellipsoid methodology. Two simple but informative numerical examples are developed to show how the identifier proposed in this paper can be used to approximate uncertain nonlinear systems valued in the complex domain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, adaptive neural network control is investigated for single-master-multiple-slaves teleoperation in consideration of time delays and input dead-zone uncertainties for multiple mobile manipulators carrying a common object in a cooperative manner. Firstly, concise dynamics of teleoperation systems consisting of a single master robot, multiple coordinated slave robots, and the object are developed in the task space. To handle asymmetric time-varying delays in communication channels and unknown asymmetric input dead zones, the nonlinear dynamics of the teleoperation system are transformed into two subsystems through feedback linearization: local master or slave dynamics including the unknown input dead zones and delayed dynamics for the purpose of synchronization. Then, a model reference neural network control strategy based on linear matrix inequalities (LMI) and adaptive techniques is proposed. The developed control approach ensures that the defined tracking errors converge to zero whereas the coordination internal force errors remain bounded and can be made arbitrarily small. Throughout this paper, stability analysis is performed via explicit Lyapunov techniques under specific LMI conditions. The proposed adaptive neural network control scheme is robust against motion disturbances, parametric uncertainties, time-varying delays, and input dead zones, which is validated by simulation studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, an adaptive control approach-based neural approximation is developed for a class of uncertain nonlinear discrete-time (DT) systems. The main characteristic of the considered systems is that they can be viewed as a class of multi-input multioutput systems in the nonstrict feedback structure. The similar control problem of this class of systems has been addressed in the past, but it focused on the continuous-time systems. Due to the complicacies of the system structure, it will become more difficult for the controller design and the stability analysis. To stabilize this class of systems, a new recursive procedure is developed, and the effect caused by the noncausal problem in the nonstrict feedback DT structure can be solved using a semirecurrent neural approximation. Based on the Lyapunov difference approach, it is proved that all the signals of the closed-loop system are semiglobal, ultimately uniformly bounded, and a good tracking performance can be guaranteed. The feasibility of the proposed controllers can be validated by setting a simulation example. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been continuously increasing interest in applying neural networks (NNs) to identification and adaptive control of practical systems that are characterized by nonlinearity, uncertainty, communication constraints, and complexity. The past few years have witnessed a variety of new developments in NN-based approaches for behavior learning, information processing, autonomous decision, and system control. Biologically inspired NN structures can significantly enhance the capabilities of information processing, control, and computational performance. New discoveries in neurocognitive psychology, sociology, and elsewhere reveal new neurological learning structures with more powerful capabilities in complex problem solving and fast decision in dynamic environments. The goal of the special issue is to consolidate recent new developments in NN structures for signal processing, autonomous decision, and adaptive control with application to complex systems. It includes contributions from a wide range of research aspects relevant to the topic, ranging from neural computing, adaptive control, cooperative control, autonomous decision systems, mathematical and computational models, neuropsychology decision and control, algorithms and simulation, to applications and/or case studies. This issue contains 24 papers and the contents of which are summarized below. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper focuses on dynamic learning from neural control for a class of nonlinear strict-feedback systems with predefined tracking performance attributes. To reduce the number of neural network (NN) approximators used and make the convergence of neural weights verified easily, state variables are introduced to transform the state-feedback control of the original strict-feedback systems into the output-feedback control of the system in the normal form. Then, using the output error transformation based on performance functions, the constrained tracking control problem of the normal systems is transformed into the stabilization problem of an equivalent unconstrained one. By combining the backstepping method, a high-gain observer with radial basis function (RBF) NNs, a novel adaptive neural control (ANC) scheme is proposed to guarantee the predefined tracking error performance as well as the ultimate boundedness of all other closed-loop signals. In particular, only one NN is employed to approximate the lumped unknown system dynamics during the controller design. Under the satisfaction of the partial persistent excitation condition for RBF NNs, the proposed stable ANC scheme is shown to be capable of achieving knowledge acquisition, expression, and storage of unknown system dynamics. The stored knowledge is reused to develop a neural learning controller for improving the control performance of the closed-loop system. When the initial condition satisfies the predefined performance, the proposed neural learning control can still guarantee the predefined tracking performance. Simulation results on a third-order one-link robot are given to show the effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper proposes a control algorithm based on adaptive dynamic programming to solve the infinite-horizon optimal control problem for known deterministic nonlinear systems with saturating actuators and nonquadratic cost functionals. The algorithm is based on an actor/critic framework, where a critic neural network (NN) is used to learn the optimal cost, and an actor NN is used to learn the optimal control policy. The adaptive control nature of the algorithm requires a persistence of excitation condition to be a priori validated, but this can be relaxed using previously stored data concurrently with current data in the update of the critic NN. A robustifying control term is added to the controller to eliminate the effect of residual errors, leading to the asymptotically stability of the closed-loop system. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed approach for a controlled Van der Pol oscillator and also for a power system plant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Two types of coupled neural networks with reaction–diffusion terms are considered in this paper. In the first one, the nodes are coupled through their states. In the second one, the nodes are coupled through the spatial diffusion terms. For the former, utilizing Lyapunov functional method and pinning control technique, we obtain some sufficient conditions to guarantee that network can realize synchronization. In addition, considering that the theoretical coupling strength required for synchronization may be much larger than the needed value, we propose an adaptive strategy to adjust the coupling strength for achieving a suitable value. For the latter, we establish a criterion for synchronization using the designed pinning controllers. It is found that the coupled reaction–diffusion neural networks with state coupling under the given linear feedback pinning controllers can realize synchronization when the coupling strength is very large, which is contrary to the coupled reaction–diffusion neural networks with spatial diffusion coupling. Moreover, a general criterion for ensuring network synchronization is derived by pinning a small fraction of nodes with adaptive feedback controllers. Finally, two examples with numerical simulations are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a novel approximation-based event-triggered control of multi-input multi-output uncertain nonlinear continuous-time systems in affine form. The controller is approximated using a linearly parameterized neural network (NN) in the context of event-based sampling. After revisiting the NN approximation property in the context of event-based sampling, an event-triggered condition is proposed using the Lyapunov technique to reduce the network resource utilization and to generate the required number of events for the NN approximation. In addition, a novel weight update law for aperiodic tuning of the NN weights at triggered instants is proposed to relax the knowledge of complete system dynamics and to reduce the computation when compared with the traditional NN-based control. Nonetheless, a nonzero positive lower bound for the inter-event times is guaranteed to avoid the accumulation of events or Zeno behavior. For analyzing the stability, the event-triggered system is modeled as a nonlinear impulsive dynamical system and the Lyapunov technique is used to show local ultimate boundedness of all signals. Furthermore, in order to overcome the unnecessary triggered events when the system states are inside the ultimate bound, a dead-zone operator is used to reset the event-trigger errors to zero. Finally, the analytical design is substantiated with numerical results. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper is concerned with the problem of integral sliding-mode control for a class of nonlinear systems with input disturbances and unknown nonlinear terms through the adaptive actor–critic (AC) control method. The main objective is to design a sliding-mode control methodology based on the adaptive dynamic programming (ADP) method, so that the closed-loop system with time-varying disturbances is stable and the nearly optimal performance of the sliding-mode dynamics can be guaranteed. In the first step, a neural network (NN)-based observer and a disturbance observer are designed to approximate the unknown nonlinear terms and estimate the input disturbances, respectively. Based on the NN approximations and disturbance estimations, the discontinuous part of the sliding-mode control is constructed to eliminate the effect of the disturbances and attain the expected equivalent sliding-mode dynamics. Then, the ADP method with AC structure is presented to learn the optimal control for the sliding-mode dynamics online. Reconstructed tuning laws are developed to guarantee the stability of the sliding-mode dynamics and the convergence of the weights of critic and actor NNs. Finally, the simulation results are presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

High-gain observers have been extensively applied to construct output-feedback adaptive neural control (ANC) for a class of feedback linearizable uncertain nonlinear systems under a nonlinear separation principle. Yet due to static-gain and linear properties, high-gain observers are usually subject to peaking responses and noise sensitivity. Existing adaptive neural network (NN) observers cannot effectively relax the limitations of high-gain observers. This paper presents an output-feedback indirect ANC strategy under a nonseparation principle, where a hybrid estimation scheme that integrates an adaptive NN observer with state variable filters is proposed to estimate plant states. By applying a single Lyapunov function candidate to the entire system, it is proved that the closed-loop system achieves practical asymptotic stability under a relatively low observer gain dominated by controller parameters. Our approach can completely avoid peaking responses without control saturation while keeping favourable noise rejection ability. Simulation results have shown effectiveness and superiority of this approach. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, adaptive neural control is investigated for a class of unknown multiple-input multiple-output nonlinear systems with time-varying asymmetric output constraints. To ensure constraint satisfaction, we employ a system transformation technique to transform the original constrained (in the sense of the output restrictions) system into an equivalent unconstrained one, whose stability is sufficient to solve the output constraint problem. It is shown that output tracking is achieved without violation of the output constraint. More specifically, we can shape the system performance arbitrarily on transient and steady-state stages with the output evolving in predefined time-varying boundaries all the time. A single neural network, whose weights are tuned online, is used in our design to approximate the unknown functions in the system dynamics, while the singularity problem of the control coefficient matrix is avoided without assumption on the prior knowledge of control input’s bound. All the signals in the closed-loop system are proved to be semiglobally uniformly ultimately bounded via Lyapunov synthesis. Finally, the merits of the proposed controller are verified in the simulation environment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Based on the neural network (NN) approximator, an online reinforcement learning algorithm is proposed for a class of affine multiple input and multiple output (MIMO) nonlinear discrete-time systems with unknown functions and disturbances. In the design procedure, two networks are provided where one is an action network to generate an optimal control signal and the other is a critic network to approximate the cost function. An optimal control signal and adaptation laws can be generated based on two NNs. In the previous approaches, the weights of critic and action networks are updated based on the gradient descent rule and the estimations of optimal weight vectors are directly adjusted in the design. Consequently, compared with the existing results, the main contributions of this paper are: 1) only two parameters are needed to be adjusted, and thus the number of the adaptation laws is smaller than the previous results and 2) the updating parameters do not depend on the number of the subsystems for MIMO systems and the tuning rules are replaced by adjusting the norms on optimal weight vectors in both action and critic networks. It is proven that the tracking errors, the adaptation laws, and the control inputs are uniformly bounded using Lyapunov analysis method. The simulation examples are employed to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the problem of learning from adaptive neural network (NN) control of a class of nonaffine nonlinear systems in uncertain dynamic environments. In the control design process, a stable adaptive NN tracking control design technique is proposed for the nonaffine nonlinear systems with a mild assumption by combining a filtered tracking error with the implicit function theorem, input-to-state stability, and the small-gain theorem. The proposed stable control design technique not only overcomes the difficulty in controlling nonaffine nonlinear systems but also relaxes constraint conditions of the considered systems. In the learning process, the partial persistent excitation (PE) condition of radial basis function NNs is satisfied during tracking control to a recurrent reference trajectory. Under the PE condition and an appropriate state transformation, the proposed adaptive NN control is shown to be capable of acquiring knowledge on the implicit desired control input dynamics in the stable control process and of storing the learned knowledge in memory. Subsequently, an NN learning control design technique that effectively exploits the learned knowledge without re-adapting to the controller parameters is proposed to achieve closed-loop stability and improved control performance. Simulation studies are performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed design techniques. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]