Control engineering

Control systems play a critical role in space flight

Control engineering or Control systems engineering is the engineering discipline that applies control theory to design systems with predictable behaviors. Multi-disciplinary in nature, control systems engineering activities focus on implementation of control systems mainly derived by mathematical modeling of systems of a diverse range.

Overview

Modern day control engineering (also called control systems engineering) is a relatively new field of study that gained a significant attention during 20th century with the advancement in technology. It can be broadly defined as practical application of control theory. Control engineering has an essential role in a wide range of control systems, from simple household washing machines to high-performance F-16 fighter aircraft. It seeks to understand physical systems, using mathematical modeling, in terms of inputs, outputs and various components with different behaviors; use control systems design tools to develop controllers for those systems; and implement controllers in physical systems employing available technology. A system can be mechanical, electrical, fluid, chemical, financial and even biological, and the mathematical modeling, analysis and controller design uses control theory in one or many of the time, frequency and complex-s domains, depending on the nature of the design problem.

History

Before it emerged as a unique discipline, control engineering was practiced as a part of mechanical engineering and control theory was studied as a part of electrical engineering, since electrical circuits can often be easily described using control theory techniques. In the very first control relationships, a current output was represented with a voltage control input. However, not having proper technology to implement electrical control systems, designers left with the option of less efficient and slow responding mechanical systems. A very effective mechanical controller that is still widely used in some hydro plants is the governor. Later on, previous to modern power electronics, process control systems for industrial applications were devised by mechanical engineers using pneumatic and hydraulic control devices, many of which are still in use today.

Control theory

Main article: Control Theory

There are two major divisions in control theory, namely, classical and modern, which have direct implications over the control engineering applications. The scope of classical control theory is limited to single-input and single-output (SISO) system design. The system analysis is carried out in time domain using differential equations, in complex-s domain with Laplace transform or in frequency domain by transforming from the complex-s domain. All systems are assumed to be second order and single variable, and higher-order system responses and multivariable effects are ignored. A controller designed using classical theory usually requires on-site tuning due to design approximations. Yet, due to easier physical implementation of classical controller designs as compared to systems designed using modern control theory, these controllers are preferred in most industrial applications. The most common controllers designed using classical control theory are PID controllers.

In contrast, modern control theory is carried out strictly in the complex-s or the frequency domain, and can deal with multi-input and multi-output (MIMO) systems. This overcomes the limitations of classical control theory in more sophisticated design problems, such as fighter aircraft control. In modern design, a system is represented as a set of first order differential equations defined using state variables. Nonlinear, multivariable, adaptive and robust control theories come under this division. Being fairly new, modern control theory has many areas yet to be explored. Scholars like Rudolf E. Kalman and Aleksandr Lyapunov are well-known among the people who have shaped modern control theory.

Recent advancement

Originally control engineering was all about continuous systems. Development of computer control tools, posed a requirement of discrete control system engineering because the communications between the computer-based digital controller and the physical system are governed by a computer clock. The equivalent to Laplace transform in the discrete domain is the z-transform. Today many of the control systems are computer controlled and they consist of both digital and analogue components. Therefore, at the design stage either digital components are mapped into the continuous domain and the design is carried out in the continuous domain, or analogue components are mapped in to discrete domain and design is carried out there. The first of these two methods is more commonly encountered in practice because many industrial systems have many continuous systems components, including mechanical, fluid, biological and analogue electrical components, with a few digital controllers.

Control systems

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Control engineering is the engineering discipline that focuses on the modeling of a diverse range of dynamic systems (e.g. mechanical systems) and the design of controllers that will cause these systems to behave in the desired manner. Although such controllers need not be electrical many are and hence control engineering is often viewed as a subfield of electrical engineering. However, the falling price of microprocessors is making the actual implementation of a control system essentially trivial. As a result, focus is shifting back to the mechanical engineering discipline, as intimate knowledge of the physical system being controlled is often desired.

Electrical circuits, digital signal processors and microcontrollers can all be used to implement Control systems. Control engineering has a wide range of applications from the flight and propulsion systems of commercial airliners to the cruise control present in many modern automobiles.

In most of the cases, control engineers utilize feedback when designing control systems. This is often accomplished using a PID controller system. For example, in an automobile with cruise control the vehicle's speed is continuously monitored and fed back to the system which adjusts the motor's torque accordingly. Where there is regular feedback, control theory can be used to determine how the system responds to such feedback. In practically all such systems stability is important and control theory can help ensure stability is achieved.

Although feedback is an important aspect of control engineering, control engineers may also work on the control of systems without feedback. This is known as open loop control. A classic example of open loop control is a washing machine that runs through a pre-determined cycle without the use of sensors.

Control engineering education

At many universities, control engineering courses are taught in electrical and electronic engineering, mechanical engineering, and aerospace engineering; in others it is connected to computer science, as most control techniques today are implemented through computers, often as embedded systems (as in the automotive field). The field of control within chemical engineering is often known as process control. It deals primarily with the control of variables in a chemical process in a plant. It is taught as part of the undergraduate curriculum of any chemical engineering program, and employs many of the same principles in control engineering. Other engineering disciplines also overlap with control engineering, as it can be applied to any system for which a suitable model can be derived.

Control engineering has diversified applications that include science, finance management, and even human behavior. Students of control engineering may start with a linear control system course dealing with the time and complex-s domain, which requires a thorough background in elementary mathematics and Laplace transform (called classical control theory). In linear control, the student does frequency and time domain analysis. Digital control and nonlinear control courses require z transformation and algebra respectively, and could be said to complete a basic control education. From here onwards there are several sub branches.

See also

• Adaptive control
• Building Automation
• Coefficient diagram method
• Control reconfiguration
• Control theory
• Feedback
• H infinity
• Intelligent control
• Laplace transform
• List of control engineering topics
• Model predictive control
• Nonlinear control
• Optimal control
• PID controller
• Process control
• Quantitative feedback theory
• Robotic unicycle
• Robust control
• Servomechanism
• State space
• Testing controller
• VisSim
• Control Engineering (magazine)
• EICASLAB

Literature

• Christopher Kilian (2005). Modern Control Technology. Thompson Delmar Learning. ISBN 1-4018-5806-6.

External links

• Control Labs Worldwide
• The Michigan Chemical Engineering Process Dynamics and Controls Open Textbook