This book explains the fundamentals of control theory for Internet of Things (IoT) systems and smart grids and its applications. It discusses the challenges imposed by large-scale systems, and describes the current and future trends and challenges in decision-making for IoT in detail, showing the ongoing industrial and academic research in the field of smart grid domain applications. It presents step-by-step design guidelines for the modeling, design, customisation and calibration of IoT systems applied to smart grids, in which the challenges increase with each system's increasing complexity. It also provides solutions and detailed examples to demonstrate how to use the techniques to overcome these challenges, as well as other problems related to decision-making for successful implementation. Further, it anaylses the features of decision-making, such as low-complexity and fault-tolerance, and uses open-source and publicly available software tools to show readers how they can design, implement and customise their own system control instantiations. This book is a valuable resource for power engineers and researchers, as it addresses the analysis and design of flexible decision-making mechanisms for smart grids. It is also of interest to students on courses related to control of large-scale systems, since it covers the use of state-of-the-art technology with examples and solutions in every chapter. And last but not least, it offers practical advice for professionals working with smart grids.

This book presents new efficient methods for optimization in realistic large-scale, multi-agent systems. These methods do not require the agents to have the full information about the system, but instead allow them to make their local decisions based only on the local information, possibly obtained during communication with their local neighbors. The book, primarily aimed at researchers in optimization and control, considers three different information settings in multi-agent systems: oracle-based, communication-based, and payoff-based. For each of these information types, an efficient optimization algorithm is developed, which leads the system to an optimal state. The optimization problems are set without such restrictive assumptions as convexity of the objective functions, complicated communication topologies, closed-form expressions for costs and utilities, and finiteness of the system's state space.

This book contains the proceedings of the Sixth National Conference of the Italian Systems Society. The title, Towards a post-Bertalanffy Systemics, aims to underline the need for Systemics and Systems Science to generalize theoretically concepts related to complexity (the great enemy of Bertalanffy Systemics). Hopefully this goal should be achieved by working in an inter-disciplinary and trans-disciplinary fashion, using systemic concepts arising from various disciplines and from the original, or Bertalanffy Systemics, as well. The interdisciplinary nature of the original Systemics and its power of generalization were given, overall, by the fact that the problems and solutions of one discipline become problems and solutions for another. Today, the modeling and interpretation of multidisciplinary approaches and representations makes easier to recognize these interconnections. The context, however, has changed dramatically. Of course, the challenge is still to find theoretical generalizations and applications, even where we have a lot of specificities, but we know very little on how to combine them. We cannot, however, simply replace the old with the new, but we must introduce strategies to recognize, represent, model and act on new levels, combining multiple representations, functions and emergence. In many disciplines this has been already done, and inevitably well, since targets and projects are well specified and oriented. The challenge is to do it for Systemics, with the vocations of cultural and theoretical generalization. Examples of new issues introduced by such theoretical disciplinary improvements, dealt with by many disciplines, include the study of mesoscopic or middle-way level, of multiple and dynamic coherence, of equivalence/non-equivalence, of fractality, of networks, of non-causality, of non-invasiveness, of non-prescribability, of non-separability, of quasi properties, of symmetry properties, of topological dynamics, as well as of quantum theories and concepts. The conference was devoted to identifying, discussing and understanding possible interrelationships of theoretical disciplinary improvements, recognized as having prospective fundamental roles for a new post-Bertalanffy Systemics. The latter should be able to deal with problems related to complexity in a generalized way. In this context the inter-disciplinarity should consists, for instance, in a disciplinary reformulation of problems, as from algebraic to geometrical, from military to political, from biological to chemical, while the trans-disciplinarity should be related to the study of such reformulations and their properties. The Italian Systems Society (AIRS) was founded in the 1996. The AIRS is a network of academicians, scientists, researchers and professionals involved in Systemics. A partial list of disciplines represented is: Architecture Biology Economics Education Engineering Mathematics Neurosciences Medicine Music Philosophy Psychology Physics. Previous conferences had as open lecturers professors Arecchi, Haken, Klir, and Kauffman. The proceedings have been published as: 1. Minati, G., (ed.), (1998), Proceedings of the first Italian Conference on Systemics, Apogeo Scientifica, Milan, Italy. 2. Minati, G., and Pessa, E., (eds.) (2002), Emergence in Complex Cognitive, Social and Biological Systems. Kluwer, New York. 3. Minati, G., Pessa, E., and Abram, M., (eds.), (2006), Systemics of Emergence: Research and Applications. Springer, New York. 4. Minati, G., Abram, M. and Pessa, E., (eds.), (2009), Processes of emergence of systems and systemic properties. Towards a general theory of emergence. World Scientific, Singapore. 5. Minati, G., Abram, M. and Pessa, E., (eds.), (2012), Methods, Models, simulations and approaches - towards a general theory of change. World Scientific, Singapore.

The papers collected in this volume focus on new perspectives on individuals, society, and science, specifically in the field of socio-economic systems. The book is the result of a scientific collaboration among experts from "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" University of Iasi (Romania), "G. d'Annunzio" University of Chieti-Pescara (Italy), "University of Defence" of Brno (Czech Republic), and "Pablo de Olavide" University of Sevilla (Spain). The heterogeneity of the contributions presented in this volume reflects the variety and complexity of social phenomena. The book is divided in four Sections as follows. The first Section deals with recent trends in social decisions. Specifically, it aims to understand which are the driving forces of social decisions. The second Section focuses on the social and public sphere. Indeed, it is oriented on recent developments in social systems and control. Trends in quantitative theories and models are described in Section 3, where many new formal, mathematical-statistical tools for modelling complex social phenomena are presented. Finally, Section 4 shows integrative theories and models; particularly, it deals with the ethical, cultural and political approaches to social science, the pedagogical methods, and the relationship between literature, politics, religion and society. The book is addressed to sociologists, philosophers, mathematicians, statisticians, people interested in ethics, and specialists in the fields of communication, social, and political sciences.

This comprehensive text presents cutting-edge advances in the theory and methodology of modeling and simulation (M&S) and reveals how this work has been influenced by the fundamental contributions of Prof. Tuncer OEren to this field. Exploring the synergies among the domains of M&S and systems engineering (SE), the book describes how M&S and SE can help to address the complex problems identified as "Grand Challenges" more effectively under a model-driven and simulation-directed systems engineering framework. Features: examines frameworks for the development of advanced simulation methodologies; presents a focus on advanced modeling methodologies; reviews the reliability and quality assurance of models; discusses the specification and simulation of human and social behavior, including models of personality, emotions, conflict management, perception and anticipation; provides a survey of the body of knowledge in M highlights the foundations established by the pioneering work of Prof. Tuncer OEren.

The study of network theory is a highly interdisciplinary field, which has emerged as a major topic of interest in various disciplines ranging from physics and mathematics, to biology and sociology. This book promotes the diverse nature of the study of complex networks by balancing the needs of students from very different backgrounds. It references the most commonly used concepts in network theory, provides examples of their applications in solving practical problems, and clear indications on how to analyse their results. In the first part of the book, students and researchers will discover the quantitative and analytical tools necessary to work with complex networks, including the most basic concepts in network and graph theory, linear and matrix algebra, as well as the physical concepts most frequently used for studying networks. They will also find instruction on some key skills such as how to proof analytic results and how to manipulate empirical network data. The bulk of the text is focused on instructing readers on the most useful tools for modern practitioners of network theory. These include degree distributions, random networks, network fragments, centrality measures, clusters and communities, communicability, and local and global properties of networks. The combination of theory, example and method that are presented in this text, should ready the student to conduct their own analysis of networks with confidence and allow teachers to select appropriate examples and problems to teach this subject in the classroom.

This book provides a synthesis of recent developments in Axiomatic Design theory and its application in large complex systems. Introductory chapters provide concise tutorial materials for graduate students and new practitioners, presenting the fundamentals of Axiomatic Design and relating its key concepts to those of model-based systems engineering. A mathematical exposition of design axioms is also provided. The main body of the book, which represents a concentrated treatment of several applications, is divided into three parts covering work on: complex products; buildings; and manufacturing systems. The book shows how design work in these areas can benefit from the scientific and systematic underpinning provided by Axiomatic Design, and in so doing effectively combines the state of the art in design research with practice. All contributions were written by an international group of leading proponents of Axiomatic Design. The book concludes with a call to action motivating further research into the engineering design of large complex systems.

This book provides a state-of-the-art overview on the dynamics and coevolution in multi-level strategic interaction games. As such it summarizes the results of the European CONGAS project, which developed new mathematical models and tools for the analysis, prediction and control of dynamical processes in systems possessing a rich multi-level structure and a web of interwoven interactions among elements with autonomous decision-making capabilities. The framework is built around game theoretical concepts, in particular evolutionary and multi-resolution games, and includes also techniques drawn from graph theory, statistical mechanics, control and optimization theory. Specific attention is devoted to systems that are prone to intermittency and catastrophic events due to the effect of collective dynamics.

This monograph bridges the gap between the nonlinear predictor as a concept and as a practical tool, presenting a complete theory of the application of predictor feedback to time-invariant, uncertain systems with constant input delays and/or measurement delays. It supplies several methods for generating the necessary real-time solutions to the systems' nonlinear differential equations, which the authors refer to as approximate predictors. Predictor feedback for linear time-invariant (LTI) systems is presented in Part I to provide a solid foundation on the necessary concepts, as LTI systems pose fewer technical difficulties than nonlinear systems. Part II extends all of the concepts to nonlinear time-invariant systems. Finally, Part III explores extensions of predictor feedback to systems described by integral delay equations and to discrete-time systems. The book's core is the design of control and observer algorithms with which global stabilization, guaranteed in the previous literature with idealized (but non-implementable) predictors, is preserved with approximate predictors developed in the book. An applications-driven engineer will find a large number of explicit formulae, which are given throughout the book to assist in the application of the theory to a variety of control problems. A mathematician will find sophisticated new proof techniques, which are developed for the purpose of providing global stability guarantees for the nonlinear infinite-dimensional delay system under feedback laws employing practically implementable approximate predictors. Researchers working on global stabilization problems for time-delay systems will find this monograph to be a helpful summary of the state of the art, while graduate students in the broad field of systems and control will advance their skills in nonlinear control design and the analysis of nonlinear delay systems.

This work is motivated by the ongoing open question of how information in the outside world is represented and processed by the brain. Consequently, several novel methods are developed. A new mathematical formulation is proposed for the encoding and decoding of analog signals using integrate-and-fire neuron models. Based on this formulation, a novel algorithm, significantly faster than the state-of-the-art method, is proposed for reconstructing the input of the neuron. Two new identification methods are proposed for neural circuits comprising a filter in series with a spiking neuron model. These methods reduce the number of assumptions made by the state-of-the-art identification framework, allowing for a wider range of models of sensory processing circuits to be inferred directly from input-output observations. A third contribution is an algorithm that computes the spike time sequence generated by an integrate-and-fire neuron model in response to the output of a linear filter, given the input of the filter encoded with the same neuron model.

This book develops original results regarding singular dynamic systems following two different paths. The first consists of generalizing results from classical state-space cases to linear descriptor systems, such as dilated linear matrix inequality (LMI) characterizations for descriptor systems and performance control under regulation constraints. The second is a new path, which considers descriptor systems as a powerful tool for conceiving new control laws, understanding and deciphering some controller's architecture and even homogenizing different-existing-ways of obtaining some new and/or known results for state-space systems. The book also highlights the comprehensive control problem for descriptor systems as an example of using the descriptor framework in order to transform a non-standard control problem into a classic stabilization control problem. In another section, an accurate solution is derived for the sensitivity constrained linear optimal control also using the descriptor framework. The book is intended for graduate and postgraduate students, as well as researchers in the field of systems and control theory.

This book focuses on filtering, control and model-reduction problems for two-dimensional (2-D) systems with imperfect information. The time-delayed 2-D systems covered have system parameters subject to uncertain, stochastic and parameter-varying changes. After an initial introduction of 2-D systems and the ideas of linear repetitive processes, the text is divided into two parts detailing: * General theory and methods of analysis and optimal synthesis for 2-D systems; and * Application of the general theory to the particular case of differential/discrete linear repetitive processes. The methods developed provide a framework for stability and performance analysis, optimal and robust controller and filter design and model approximation for the systems considered. Solutions to the design problems are couched in terms of linear matrix inequalities. For readers interested in the state of the art in linear filtering, control and model reduction, Filtering and Control for Classes of Two-Dimensional Systems will be a useful reference for exploring the field of 2-D systems either from a purely theoretical research perspective or from the point of view of a multitude of potential applications including image processing, and the study of seismographic data or thermal processes.

This book is a systematic summary of some new advances in the area of nonlinear analysis and design in the frequency domain, focusing on the application oriented theory and methods based on the GFRF concept, which is mainly done by the author in the past 8 years. The main results are formulated uniformly with a parametric characteristic approach, which provides a convenient and novel insight into nonlinear influence on system output response in terms of characteristic parameters and thus facilitate nonlinear analysis and design in the frequency domain. The book starts with a brief introduction to the background of nonlinear analysis in the frequency domain, followed by recursive algorithms for computation of GFRFs for different parametric models, and nonlinear output frequency properties. Thereafter the parametric characteristic analysis method is introduced, which leads to the new understanding and formulation of the GFRFs, and nonlinear characteristic output spectrum (nCOS) and the nCOS based analysis and design method. Based on the parametric characteristic approach, nonlinear influence in the frequency domain can be investigated with a novel insight, i.e., alternating series, which is followed by some application results in vibration control. Magnitude bounds of frequency response functions of nonlinear systems can also be studied with a parametric characteristic approach, which result in novel parametric convergence criteria for any given parametric nonlinear model whose input-output relationship allows a convergent Volterra series expansion. This book targets those readers who are working in the areas related to nonlinear analysis and design, nonlinear signal processing, nonlinear system identification, nonlinear vibration control, and so on. It particularly serves as a good reference for those who are studying frequency domain methods for nonlinear systems.

This volume is dedicated to Professor Okyay Kaynak to commemorate his life time impactful research and scholarly achievements and outstanding services to profession. The 21 invited chapters have been written by leading researchers who, in the past, have had association with Professor Kaynak as either his students and associates or colleagues and collaborators. The focal theme of the volume is the Sliding Modes covering a broad scope of topics from theoretical investigations to their significant applications from Control to Intelligent Mechatronics.

This book is dedicated to Professor Selim G. Akl to honour his groundbreaking research achievements in computer science over four decades. The book is an intellectually stimulating excursion into emergent computing paradigms, architectures and implementations. World top experts in computer science, engineering and mathematics overview exciting and intriguing topics of musical rhythms generation algorithms, analyse the computational power of random walks, dispelling a myth of computational universality, computability and complexity at the microscopic level of synchronous computation, descriptional complexity of error detection, quantum cryptography, context-free parallel communicating grammar systems, fault tolerance of hypercubes, finite automata theory of bulk-synchronous parallel computing, dealing with silent data corruptions in high-performance computing, parallel sorting on graphics processing units, mining for functional dependencies in relational databases, cellular automata optimisation of wireless sensors networks, connectivity preserving network transformers, constrained resource networks, vague computing, parallel evolutionary optimisation, emergent behaviour in multi-agent systems, vehicular clouds, epigenetic drug discovery, dimensionality reduction for intrusion detection systems, physical maze solvers, computer chess, parallel algorithms to string alignment, detection of community structure. The book is a unique combination of vibrant essays which inspires scientists and engineers to exploit natural phenomena in designs of computing architectures of the future.

The present book includes a set of selected papers from the tenth "International Conference on Informatics in Control Automation and Robotics" (ICINCO 2013), held in Reykjavik, Iceland, from 29 to 31 July 2013. The conference was organized in four simultaneous tracks: "Intelligent Control Systems and Optimization", "Robotics and Automation", "Signal Processing, Sensors, Systems Modeling and Control" and "Industrial Engineering, Production and Management". The book is based on the same structure. ICINCO 2013 received 255 paper submissions from 50 countries, in all continents. After a double blind paper review performed by the Program Committee only 30% were published and presented orally. A further refinement was made after the conference, based also on the assessment of presentation quality, so that this book includes the extended and revised versions of the very best papers of ICINCO 2013.

Industrial Applications of Affective Engineering introduces new analytical methods such as fluctuation, fuzzy logic, fractals, and complex systems, and pursuing interdisciplinary research that traverses a wide range of fields, including information engineering, human engineering, cognitive science, psychology, and design studies. The book is split into two parts: theory and applications. The book is a collection of the best papers from ISAE2013 (International Symposium of Affective Engineering) held at Kitakyushu, Japan and Japan Kansei Engineering Meeting on March 6-8, 2013.

This book presents the results of the seminar Wind Energy and the Impact of Turbulence on the Conversion Process which was supported from three societies, namely the EUROMech, EAWE and ERCOFATC and took place in Oldenburg, Germany in spring 2012.

The seminar was one of the first scientific meetings devoted to the common topic of wind energy and basic turbulence. The established community of researchers working on the challenging puzzle of turbulence for decades met the quite young community of researchers, who face the upcoming challenges in the fast growing field of wind energy applications.

From the fluid mechanical point of view, wind turbines are large machines operating in the fully turbulent atmospheric boundary layer. In particular they are facing small-scale turbulent inflow conditions. It is one of the central puzzles in basic turbulence research to achieve a fundamental understanding of the peculiarities of small-scale turbulence. This book helps to better understand the resulting aerodynamics around the wind turbine s blades and the forces transmitted into the machinery in this context of puzzling inflow conditions. This is a big challenge due to the multi-scale properties of the incoming wind field ranging from local flow conditions on the profile up to the interaction of wake flows in wind farms."

This book presents basic research on delta operator systems (DOS) with actuator saturation. It proposes null controllable regions of delta operator systems, introduces the enlarging of the domain of attraction and analyzes the performance of DOSs subject to actuator saturation. It also discusses the domain of attraction on different systems in delta domain, and investigates the applications in complicated systems using delta operator approaches.

New practical techniques for nonlinear system research and evaluation

Nonlinear Systems Techniques and Applications provides the most practical techniques currently available for analyzing and identifying nonlinear systems from random data measured at the input and output points of the nonlinear systems. These new techniques require only one-dimensional spectral functions that are much simpler to compute and apply than previous nonlinear procedures. The new results show when and how to replace a wide class of single-input/single-output nonlinear models with simpler equivalent multiple-input/single-output linear models. While other techniques are usually restricted to Gaussian data, the new techniques developed here apply to data with arbitrary probability, correlation, and spectral properties.

Numerous examples used in the book are based on the analysis of real physical data passing through real nonlinear systems in the fields of oceanography, automotive engineering, and biomedical research.

For practicing engineers and scientists involved in aerospace, automotive, biomedical, electrical, mechanical, oceanographic, and other activities concerned with nonlinear system analysis, Nonlinear Systems Techniques and Applications is the essential reference work in the field.

This book reports on the latest advances and applications of chaotic systems. It consists of 25 contributed chapters by experts who are specialized in the various topics addressed in this book. The chapters cover a broad range of topics of chaotic systems such as chaos, hyperchaos, jerk systems, hyperjerk systems, conservative and dissipative systems, circulant chaotic systems, multi-scroll chaotic systems, finance chaotic system, highly chaotic systems, chaos control, chaos synchronization, circuit realization and applications of chaos theory in secure communications, mobile robot, memristors, cellular neural networks, etc. Special importance was given to chapters offering practical solutions, modeling and novel control methods for the recent research problems in chaos theory. This book will serve as a reference book for graduate students and researchers with a basic knowledge of chaos theory and control systems. The resulting design procedures on the chaotic systems are emphasized using MATLAB software.

This book offers a detailed investigation of breakdowns in traffic and transportation networks. It shows empirically that transitions from free flow to so-called synchronized flow, initiated by local disturbances at network bottlenecks, display a nucleation-type behavior: while small disturbances in free flow decay, larger ones grow further and lead to breakdowns at the bottlenecks. Further, it discusses in detail the significance of this nucleation effect for traffic and transportation theories, and the consequences this has for future automatic driving, traffic control, dynamic traffic assignment, and optimization in traffic and transportation networks. Starting from a large volume of field traffic data collected from various sources obtained solely through measurements in real world traffic, the author develops his insights, with an emphasis less on reviewing existing methodologies, models and theories, and more on providing a detailed analysis of empirical traffic data and drawing consequences regarding the minimum requirements for any traffic and transportation theories to be valid. The book - proves the empirical nucleation nature of traffic breakdown in networks - discusses the origin of the failure of classical traffic and transportation theories - shows that the three-phase theory is incommensurable with the classical traffic theories, and - explains why current state-of-the art dynamic traffic assignments tend to provoke heavy traffic congestion, making it a valuable reference resource for a wide audience of scientists and postgraduate students interested in the fundamental understanding of empirical traffic phenomena and related data-driven phenomenology, as well as for practitioners working in the fields of traffic and transportation engineering.

This book presents up-to-date research developments and novel methodologies to solve various stability and control problems of dynamic systems with time delays. First, it provides the new introduction of integral and summation inequalities for stability analysis of nominal time-delay systems in continuous and discrete time domain, and presents corresponding stability conditions for the nominal system and an applicable nonlinear system. Next, it investigates several control problems for dynamic systems with delays including H(infinity) control problem Event-triggered control problems; Dynamic output feedback control problems; Reliable sampled-data control problems. Finally, some application topics covering filtering, state estimation, and synchronization are considered. The book will be a valuable resource and guide for graduate students, scientists, and engineers in the system sciences and control communities.

In this monograph the author presents explicit conditions for the exponential, absolute and input-to-state stabilities including solution estimates of certain types of functional differential equations. The main methodology used is based on a combination of recent norm estimates for matrix-valued functions, comprising the generalized Bohl-Perron principle, together with its integral version and the positivity of fundamental solutions. A significant part of the book is especially devoted to the solution of the generalized Aizerman problem.