Control of Networked Multi-Vehicle Systems

by

Professor Raja Sengupta

University of California – Berkeley

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering

Abstract --There is a growing interest in leveraging the wireless networking revolution to control multi-vehicle systems. For many years, the Von Neumann bridge for control has been provided by the synchronous model of computation. Designs analytically developed in differential or difference equation models get implemented on sequential machines via compilers like Simulink or Esterel that preserve the synchronous semantic.

Unfortunately this rigorous bridge between the analytical and the implementation is difficult to maintain in the new class of wirelessly connected control systems. In this context, I will discuss our experience building networks of cars and unmanned air vehicles. I will present results on the distributed compilation of synchronous programs over lossless channels, point out fundamental limitations of this approach, and review new models of computation for these new systems. Amongst new models, we will focus on the area of "Networked Control Systems" which considers the flow of information over lossy wireless channels. We will conclude with our contributions to this literature on stabilization in the LQG setting and for joint design of control and network in the H-infinity setting.

Bio: Dr. Raja Sengupta is an Assistant Professor in the Systems program within Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of California at Berkeley. He received his Ph.d from the EECS department, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. He is Director of the PATH Wireless Laboratory and Co-PI of the Center for Collaborative Control of Unmanned Vehicles. He is Associate Editor of the IEEE Control Systems magazine and the Journal of Intelligent Transportation Systems. He was Program Chair of the IEEE Conference on Autonomous Intelligent Networked Systems 2003 and is Co-General Program Chair of the second ACM MOBICOM Workshop on Vehicular Ad-hoc Networks 2005.

Friday, September 23, 2005

3:30 – 4:30p.m.

Rm. 1500 EECS