Feedforward control of inhomogeneous linear first order distributed parameter systems

The paper presents a new approach for feed forward control of inhomogeneous distributed parameter systems. Inhomogeneous means that we consider a partial differential equation (PDE) with a spatially distributed control input. For the system we propose a transformation that homogenizes the PDE by transforming the input action on the boundary. Based on the transformation, a feedforward control approach is presented, allowing for an iterative computation of the control input from a desired output trajectory. To demonstrate the approach we apply it in detail to two examples: a continuous furnace and a counterflow heat exchanger.