Advanced Control of Complex Dynamical Systems with Applications

There are many practical systems which can be modelled by dynamical equations. Increasing requirements on system performance mean that within control system analysis and design it is necessary to deal with the increasingly complex dynamical systems that are used to model reality. The complexity stems from nonlinearity, uncertainty, time delay, system singularity, stochastic effects, the presence of interconnections, and so forth. Advances in both technology and control theory have provided the potential to investigate complex dynamical systems. Study on complex systems is becoming increasingly important and this has provided renewed impetus for the development of novel techniques and skills for complex control systems. This provides the motivation for this special issue. The purpose of this special issue is to provide an opportunity for scientists and control engineers to publish their latest, novel, and original contributions to the development of complex control systems. The special issue focusses on recent achievements and applications in the field of control and analysis for complex systems with a special emphasis on how to solve various control design and/or observer design problems for nonlinear systems and interconnected systems. The considered systems typically involve at least two features such as nonlinearity, disturbances/uncertainty, faults, time delay, interconnections between subsystems, system singularity, stochastic processes, and comparison between simulation and experiments. The special issue focuses on results in theoretical research and practical applications with emphasis on novel methodologies for analysis, design, synthesis, and/or applications. The topics within the special issue include interconnected/networked systems, variable structure control, singular system control, time delay systems, fuzzy control and impulsive control, robust observer design and parameter identification, fault detection and fault tolerant control, analysis and control of stochastic systems, and applications of advanced control systems. A total of 109 papers were submitted to the special issue for possible publication and 38 of them were accepted and published following a fair and rigorous review process organised by the guest editorial team with the help of the editorial office. The acceptance rate is less than 35%. The accepted papers have been grouped in the following six clusters.