Backstepping-based active fault-tolerant control for a class of uncertain SISO nonlinear systems

Active fault-tolerant control is investigated for a class of uncertain SISO nonlinear flight control systems based on the adaptive observer, feedback linearization and backstepping theory. Firstly an adaptive observer is constructed to estimate the fault in the faulty system. A new fault updating law is presented to simplify the assumption conditions of the adaptive observer. The asymptotical stability of the observer and the uniform ultimate boundedness of the fault estimation error are guaranteed by Lyapunov theorem. Then a backstepping-based active fault-tolerant controller is designed for the faulty system. The asymptotical stability of the closed-loop system and uniform ultimate boundedness of the tracking error are proved based on Lyapunov theorem. The effectiveness of the proposed scheme is demonstrated through the numerical simulation of a flight control system.