Parametric Identification Using Weighted Null-Space Fitting

In identification of dynamical systems, the prediction error method with a quadratic cost function provides asymptotically efficient estimates under Gaussian noise, but in general it requires solving a nonconvex optimization problem, which may imply convergence to nonglobal minima. An alternative class of methods uses a nonparametric model as intermediate step to obtain the model of interest. Weighted null-space fitting (WNSF) belongs to this class, starting with the estimate of a nonparametric ARX model with least squares. Then, the reduction to a parametric model is a multistep procedure where each step consists of the solution of a quadratic optimization problem, which can be obtained with weighted least squares. The method is suitable for both open- and closed-loop data, and can be applied to many common parametric model structures, including output-error, ARMAX, and Box-Jenkins. The price to pay is the increase of dimensionality in the nonparametric model, which needs to tend to infinity as function of the sample size for certain asymptotic statistical properties to hold. In this paper, we conduct a rigorous analysis of these properties: namely, consistency, and asymptotic efficiency. Also, we perform a simulation study illustrating the performance of WNSF and identify scenarios where it can be particularly advantageous compared with state-of-the-art methods.