Tracking noisy limit cycle oscillation with nonlinear filters

For engineering systems, the dynamic state estimates provide valuable information for the detection and prediction of failure due to noise and vibration. From this perspective, nonlinear filtering techniques are applied to the problem of state estimation of dynamical systems undergoing noisy limit cycle oscillation. Specifically, the extended Kalman filter, ensemble Kalman filter and particle filter are used to track the limit cycle oscillations of a Duffing oscillator using noisy observational data. The noisy limit cycle oscillations feature highly non-Gaussian trends. The efficiency and limitations of the extended Kalman filter, ensemble Kalman filter and particle filter in tracking limit cycle oscillations are examined with respect to the model and measurement noise and sparsity of measurement data. For the limit cycle oscillations considered here, it is demonstrated that the ensemble Kalman filter and particle filter outperform the extended Kalman filter in the presence of sparse observational data or strong measurement noise. For moderate measurement noise and frequent measurement data, the ensemble Kalman filter and particle filter perform equally well in comparison to the extended Kalman filter.