Optimal actuator\sensor placement and controller design for large flexible space structures and robotics

This paper emphasizes the characterization of the dynamic motions of large flexible space structures (LFSS) and robotic arms in terms of poles and zeros, in order to develops a computational scheme for optimization of actuator and sensor locations. The importance and dependence of the transmission zeros of the open-loop systems on the actuators and sensor locations are discussed. The uses of Genetic Algorithms (GAs) for the optimal placement of the collocated actuators and sensors of such plants are presented. The role of computational scheme using GAs in providing a direct and uncomplicated synthesis technique for the design and development of active controllers for LFSS are also demonstrated. The performance of such genetically designed active controllers is addressed by considering integral-square-error (ISE) as the ultimate design requirement. The effectiveness of this methodology is illustrated by application to a simple cantilever beam example.