ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-09-03DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.09.003
Yutang Wang, Wenhao Li, Yan Li, Dapeng Tian
{"title":"Novel anti-saturation adaptive sliding-mode-assisted disturbance observer for aerial imaging systems.","authors":"Yutang Wang, Wenhao Li, Yan Li, Dapeng Tian","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.09.003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.09.003","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Aerial imaging systems are subject to complex multisource disturbances, including high-frequency engine vibrations and abrupt aerodynamic turbulence, which critically hinder line-of-sight stabilization. Moreover, input saturation nonlinearities imposed by stringent onboard hardware constraints severely limit the capability of the system to reject highly dynamic perturbations. To address these challenges, this study proposes a novel anti-saturation adaptive sliding-mode-assisted disturbance observer. The proposed scheme integrates a dual-strategy anti-saturation mechanism. First, a dynamic unsaturation-scale factor mathematically quantifies the residual driving capacity of the actuator to actively regulate the adaptive sliding-mode gain in real time. Second, a describing-function-based constraint is strictly embedded into the exact observer error dynamics. This dual approach intelligently manages the control effort within absolute physical limits, preventing integral windup, gain over-regulation, and catastrophic observer divergence during deep saturation. Through rigorous Lyapunov stability analysis, all closed-loop signals are proven to exhibit global uniform ultimate boundedness. Finally, comparative experiments conducted on an equivalent gimbal platform validated the superiority of the proposed controller in achieving both high dynamic disturbance rejection and high-precision imaging in adverse aerial environments. The proposed algorithm outperformed existing anti-disturbance methods in terms of convergence speed and dynamic performance, thereby validating its robustness.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-09-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148908255","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-09-02DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.034
Zhongchao Zhang, Guangqiu Wang, Yiming Li, Kai Huang
{"title":"A safety-constrained deep reinforcement learning strategy for velocity control of a pipeline inspection robot.","authors":"Zhongchao Zhang, Guangqiu Wang, Yiming Li, Kai Huang","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.034","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.034","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Maintaining stable velocity control for a self-propelled pipeline inspection robot remains challenging under high-dimensional state spaces, time-varying friction, and non-stationary operating conditions. This study proposes a safety-constrained deep reinforcement learning control strategy for robust velocity regulation under contact-friction and lubrication disturbances. The proposed method employs a quantile-based distributional critic with a Huber loss to improve value estimation under uncertain disturbances. A lower-tail distributional risk indicator is introduced to regulate curiosity-driven exploration and clipped policy updates. In addition, a safety shield projects raw actions into the feasible actuator range, and the shield correction cost is fed back into policy learning. The controller is trained in Isaac Sim and deployed on an experimental prototype. Experiments are conducted under different operating conditions and velocity disturbances. Compared with the A2C baseline and ablation variants, the proposed method achieves lower MAPE under all tested conditions, with an average reduction of at least 16.5%. Compared with alternative value- and policy-update variants, the proposed method reduces the average MAPE and IQR by 67.4%-76.0% and 41.3%-62.7%, respectively, while exhibiting lower overshoot. These results indicate that the proposed method improves tracking accuracy, reduces velocity dispersion, and enhances velocity-control robustness under the tested contact and lubrication disturbances.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148889806","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Performance-driven selective high-order stochastic iterative learning control with probabilistic guarantees.","authors":"Kunhong Chen, Zeyi Zhang, Yujin Cai, Tianbo Zhang, Hao Jiang, Dong Shen","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.09.001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.09.001","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This paper investigates stochastic iterative learning control (SILC) for discrete-time linear time-varying systems subject to process and measurement noise. High-order learning can smooth input updates by reusing historical errors, but a fixed high-order structure may sacrifice transient tracking performance when obsolete or poorly aligned data are incorporated. To address this smoothing-transient trade-off, we develop a selective enhanced high-order SILC, in which historical tracking errors are treated as candidate learning data and are admitted only through a performance-driven probabilistic test. Historical information is used only when its predictive surrogate outperforms the proportional-type baseline with a prescribed conditional probability under an auxiliary law or moment class. We establish directional and feasibility results, ideal and practical surrogate guarantees, variance reduction, and asymptotic convergence. Furthermore, the asymptotic convergence of the proposed method is proved. The simulation results illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed selective high-order learning strategy in improving the transient-smoothness trade-off.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148908304","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-09-02DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.036
Boyin Zheng, Yahui Hao, Lu Liu
{"title":"Adaptive event-triggered observer design for uncertain target enclosing of multi-agent systems.","authors":"Boyin Zheng, Yahui Hao, Lu Liu","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.036","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.036","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This article investigates the cooperative target enclosing control problem of multi-agent systems under uncertain target motion using event-triggered communication. A novel event-triggered adaptive internal-model-based observer is proposed to estimate the target's position and velocity asymptotically without requiring exact knowledge of target dynamics and continuous monitoring among neighboring agents. A new event-triggering mechanism (ETM) with a strictly positive minimum inter-event time (MIET) is developed by incorporating three non-increasing resettable timer variables based on the observer states. The proposed observer design not only compensates for the sampling errors, but also associates the existence of the positive MIET with the boundedness of the system states. In addition, a new distributed formation control law that only uses the event-triggered neighboring information is designed. Simulations show that the MAS tracks the target's position and velocity asymptotically while achieving the prescribed formation pattern.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148922070","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-09-02DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.035
Yi Huang, Zhiyong Chen, Zhixin Zhang, Zuguo Chen, Chunhua Yang
{"title":"Tracking error analysis for multi-train systems under velocity constraints and parameter uncertainties.","authors":"Yi Huang, Zhiyong Chen, Zhixin Zhang, Zuguo Chen, Chunhua Yang","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.035","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This paper investigates the cooperative tracking error for multi-train systems subject to velocity constraints and time-varying resistance parameter uncertainties. A distributed tracking control algorithm, utilizing only relative position measurements between adjacent trains, is proposed to enable all trains to track a desired operational velocity while maintaining a desired formation. To analyze the coupled effects of velocity saturation and parameter uncertainties, we introduce a time-varying scaling factor to handle the saturation nonlinearity, transforming the original system into an equivalent form with a bounded, non-vanishing disturbance term. We rigorously prove ultimate boundedness of the disagreement state, the relative position errors, and the absolute velocity errors. Furthermore, explicit analytical expressions for the corresponding ultimate bounds are derived. Numerical simulations of a multi-train system are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed control law and the accuracy of the theoretical error analysis.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148914606","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-09-01DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.030
Zaihong Zheng, Dan Li, Huanqing Wang, Ping Li, Ming Chen
{"title":"Prescribed-time sliding mode control for uncertain nonlinear systems based on periodic delayed feedback and disturbance observer.","authors":"Zaihong Zheng, Dan Li, Huanqing Wang, Ping Li, Ming Chen","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.030","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.030","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This paper addresses the trajectory tracking control problem of nonlinear systems subject to uncertain disturbances by proposing a unified prescribed-time control framework integrating disturbance observation and performance constraints. First, a prescribed-time disturbance observer with smooth adaptive gains and a time-varying scaling function is designed to ensure that the disturbance estimation error converges within a prescribed time. Subsequently, a prescribed-time sliding mode surface incorporating periodic delay feedback and time-varying switching gains is constructed to enhance robustness and accelerate the convergence process. Furthermore, a performance constraint mechanism based on a logarithmic barrier function is introduced to guarantee that the tracking error strictly satisfies the prescribed time-varying performance bounds throughout the response. Lyapunov stability analysis shows that the closed-loop system achieves prescribed-time convergence while satisfying the prescribed transient and steady-state performance requirements. Simulation results on a third-order Van der Pol system and a two-link robotic manipulator validate the effectiveness of the proposed method in terms of convergence speed, tracking accuracy, robustness, and control input smoothness.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148957654","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-08-29DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.031
Wenqiang Wei, Yu Bai, Ke Cui, Yang Gao, Xiong Cheng, Chong Shen, Daying Sun, Huiliang Cao
{"title":"Anti-disturbance tracking control for MEMS gyroscopes with resilient guaranteed profiles: Theory and experiments.","authors":"Wenqiang Wei, Yu Bai, Ke Cui, Yang Gao, Xiong Cheng, Chong Shen, Daying Sun, Huiliang Cao","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.031","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.031","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In this paper, an anti-disturbance tracking control scheme with resilient guaranteed profiles is proposed for microelectromechanical system (MEMS) gyroscopes. First, a state observer is constructed for cases in which the velocity measurement is unavailable or severely affected by measurement noise. Based on the recovered velocity information and the invariant manifold principle, a filter-based unknown system dynamics estimator (USDE) is then developed to estimate the system uncertainties. Second, to meet the stringent time and accuracy requirements of MEMS gyroscopes in practical measurement tasks, a resilient quantitative guaranteed performance control (RQGPC) strategy with a dynamically adjustable envelope is proposed. By introducing an auxiliary submodule to monitor input saturation, the proposed RQGPC can accommodate saturation effects while avoiding violations of the preset error constraints. The proposed scheme constrains the convergence process within a predesigned region. Consequently, the overshoot and settling time can be specified by the user, and effective tracking performance can be maintained under parameter uncertainties, external disturbances, and input saturation. Finally, the closed-loop stability is analyzed using Lyapunov theory, and the effectiveness of the proposed method is verified through simulation and experimental results.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-08-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148893026","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-08-27DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.028
Chao Jia, Junjie Ping
{"title":"Can predefined-time stability be guaranteed for discrete-time systems? Novel theorems and a sliding mode realization.","authors":"Chao Jia, Junjie Ping","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.028","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.028","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>While the theories of predefined-time (PdT) stability have been well established for continuous-time systems, research on discrete-time systems remains an open problem. This paper investigates stability control for nonlinear discrete-time perturbed systems and proposes the discrete-time PdT stability concept. Based on this concept, this paper develops two Lyapunov theories-the Lyapunov theory for PdT stability and that for practical PdT stability. Furthermore, this paper constructs a PdT discrete-time sliding mode controller for a class of second-order perturbed systems, which guarantees PdT stability throughout the reaching and sliding phases. Additionally, this paper presents an evaluation of the proposed discrete-time sliding mode control method, centered on an analysis of its key performance indicators. The results of numerical simulations and physical scenario-based simulations verify the method's effectiveness.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-08-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148876872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-08-27DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.027
Yajing Zhao, Xiaoping Liu, Cungen Liu, Na Wang
{"title":"Adjustable transient performance for unknown nonlinear systems via control gain selection: Application to tower crane systems.","authors":"Yajing Zhao, Xiaoping Liu, Cungen Liu, Na Wang","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.027","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.027","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This paper proposes a modified adaptive backstepping method with a control gain selection guideline for unknown nonlinear systems, focusing on adjustable transient performances. Unlike conventional backstepping methods that cancel linear cross terms, the proposed approach retains these terms to obtain a symmetric state matrix for the linearized closed-loop system. Based on this structure, a novel control gain determination method is developed to select control gains for achieving a desired settling time while effectively attenuating overshoot. Compared with conventional trial-and-error tuning, the proposed method improves tuning efficiency. Moreover, the potential solvability difficulties of optimization-based pole-placement methods are avoided. Numerical examples with different desired settling times demonstrate adjustable settling time and overshoot attenuation. Simulations and experiments on a tower crane platform further validate the proposed scheme and demonstrate its advantages compared with existing control methods.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-08-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148876773","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
ISA transactionsPub Date : 2026-08-27DOI: 10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.022
Yanzhe Yang, Zhiping Chen, Haiping Ai, Yawei Zheng, An Zhu, Xiaodong Fu
{"title":"Predefined-time disturbance observer-based fuzzy tracking control for uncertain space robot with global prescribed performance.","authors":"Yanzhe Yang, Zhiping Chen, Haiping Ai, Yawei Zheng, An Zhu, Xiaodong Fu","doi":"10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.022","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isatra.2026.08.022","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In this paper, an adaptive fuzzy prescribed performance control strategy based on predefined-time theory is proposed for a space robot under external disturbances and dynamic uncertainties. Firstly, an adaptive fuzzy backstepping framework that integrates predefined-time control theory is presented. To mitigate the impact of external disturbances on tracking performance, a predefined-time nonlinear disturbance observer (PTNDO) is introduced to compensate for them, thereby enhancing the convergence accuracy of trajectory tracking control. Next, global predefined-time prescribed performance control (PTPPC) is introduced to improve the transient and steady-state performance of the control system. Additionally, a single-parameter fuzzy logic system (FLS) is introduced to compensate for dynamic uncertainties in the system. An adaptive fuzzy predefined-time controller is then developed based on PTNDO, PTPPC, and single-parameter FLS. Compared to multi-parameter FLS, single-parameter FLS reduces the consumption of computational resources while retaining the desired level of approximation accuracy. By utilizing PTNDO and PTPPC, the transient and steady-state performance of the space robot control system are enhanced and the limitations of traditional prescribed performance control caused by initial states are avoided. The predefined-time stability of the proposed controller is rigorously proven by using Lyapunov theory, and numerical simulations demonstrate its superiority and effectiveness compared with existing methods.</p>","PeriodicalId":94059,"journal":{"name":"ISA transactions","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":6.5,"publicationDate":"2026-08-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148876880","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}