MIMO experiment design based on asymptotic model order theory

In this paper we investigate the problem of de-signing an input signal for a Multi-Input Multi-Output plant to minimize a control-oriented criterion. By employing Ljung's asymptotic (in model order and sample size) covariance formu-las, we determine closed form expressions for the optimal input, which provide direct insight into the effect of the principal directions and gains of the open- and closed-loop transfer functions on the kind of experiment to be applied.