State estimation for boundary-coupled parabolic distributed parameter systems using spatial averages

This paper proposes an indirect method for designing a Luenberger-type state observer for systems described by boundary-coupled two parabolic partial differential equations. In particular, we concentrate on the case where outputs are spatial averages of the state variables. The proposed method consists of two steps. We first introduce a state transformation that converts the system into another system with boundary measurement. Then, the backstepping approach can provide a state observer for the converted system. An estimate of the original state variables is constructed through the inverse transformation. The performance of the proposed observer is confirmed by a numerical simulation.