An interface between continuous and discrete-event controllers for vehicle automation

Automation of highways and in particular platooning of vehicles raises a number of control issues. In the design proposed in Varaiya (1993) these issues are addressed by a hierarchical structure consisting of both discrete event and continuous time controllers. The work presented here is an attempt at constructing a consistent interface between these two types of controllers. The design proposed is a finite state machine that communicates with the discrete controllers through discrete commands and flags and with the continuous controllers by issuing commands that get translated to inputs for the vehicle actuators. The operation of the proposed design is tested using COSPAN.