A model predictive control approach to networked systems

This paper addresses the problem of controller design for networked control systems regulated by a network data transmission scheme proposed in G. Zhang and T. Chen (2005). The plant under the transmission constraint is first formulated as a mixed logical dynamical system, then model predictive control (MPC) based on the mixed-integer programming is applied to derive the controller. It is shown that the non-convexity feature of this class of networked control systems rules out piecewise affine controllers that are designable for linear convex problems. Nevertheless, controller design is still feasible due to the special nature of the data transmission strategy, i.e., only a small number of logic values is involved. An example is given to illustrate the strength of the proposed approach.