Adaptive minimum uncertainty control for a flexible link manipulator

The development of an adaptive controller for a flexible link manipulator is the subject of this article. The system's measurements are assumed to be corrupted with noise of a priori known bounds. A Set Membership Identifier computes the feasible set (orthotope) within which the parameter vector resides. The orthotope's vertices provide the parameter-vector's bounds, which are used to compute the predicted system-output uncertainty. The controller tunes its gains through an on-line minimization of a cost that penalizes the control effort, the induced uncertainty on the system output, and the tracking error. The scheme is applied in simulation studies on a planar single flexible-link manipulator.