Date of final exam: 01/02/2001

E-mail: lecchini@ing.unibs.it

Tutor: Prof.  M. Campi, Università di Brescia

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Virtual Reference Feedback Tuning: a new direct method for the design of feedback controllers   ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Advisor:

Prof.  M. Campi, Università di Brescia

Summary of the thesis

The object of the research has been the design of the controller for a plant whose dynamics was unknown. The original contribution consists in the development of a new method that solves this problem on the basis of a set of I/O data collected from the plant. The method has been named Virtual Reference Feedback Tuning (VRFT).

The main features of VRFT are that it is a direct method (no model identification of the plant is needed) and that it can be applied using a single set of data generated by the plant with no need for specific experiments or iterations. It has been shown that the method searches for the global optimum of the design criterion and that, in the significant case of restricted complexity controller design, the achieved controller is a sensible approximation of the restricted complexity global optimal controller.

As an extra contribution, this thesis delivers a new controller validation test aiming at ascertaining the closed-loop stability before the designed controller is applied to the plant.
 

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