Reconfigurable distributed control based upon smart peripheral elements

Increasingly, there is a move towards in-built intelligence for sensors and actuators to integrate "smart" peripheral elements as part of a distributed control system. The utilisation of local intelligence to provide local fault detection and fault tolerance opens the incorporation of new variables into the structure of the control law. How to integrate this information into the structure of the control law is studied in here. The main idea is to integrate a decision making procedure between peripheral elements and different control strategies. The reconfiguration of the control law based upon local health measures is decided by this procedure.