On a Continuous-Time Version of Willems’ Lemma

In this paper, a method to represent every input-output trajectory of a continuous-time linear system in terms of previously collected data is presented. This corresponds to a continuous-time version of the well-known Willems’ lemma. The result is obtained by sampling the continuous signals at regular intervals, and constructing Hankel-like structures that closely resemble their discrete-time counterparts. Then, it is shown how to use measured persistently excited data to design a time-varying vector of parameters that allows the generation of arbitrary piecewise differentiable trajectories. A class of input signals that satisfies the conditions for persistence of excitation is also provided.