Nonlinear Predictive Control based on Asynchronous Measurement and Control Signals

In many control problems the measurement instances might not be available in a periodically-equally-distributed way and/or the same might occur to the control signals. Moreover, due to the sensor evaluation time, calibration of actuators and sensors, or required computational time, inevitable delays can often arise. Both variable sampling times and delays must be considered during the control design in order to avoid instability and performance loss. In this paper, it is shown that predictive control methods, based on continuous time models, can be used to stabilize nonlinear systems under both non-equidistant sampling times and delays. Furthermore, it is outlined how sensors and control sampling instants can be actively utilized such that the control signal is updated only when necessary.