Supervisory Control and Regulation of Discrete Dynamical Systems

我们提出的研究属于工程和应用数学的分支，称为自动控制或控制论，即反馈系统的科学和技术。这类系统的设计目的是将一些关键变量保持在可接受的范围内。例如，飞机的自动驾驶系统会纠正风的干扰，否则风可能会导致飞机偏离航线，这可能是灾难性的。我们特别感兴趣的是系统，比如交通系统，它必须对瞬时事件做出反应，比如车辆到达十字路口；制造系统必须对新零件订单或机器故障做出反应。另一个例子是汽车上的按钮系统，虽然它是由驾驶者“随机”激活的，但它应该被设计成永远不会陷入“挂断”或阻塞等逻辑错误。** **这样的离散事件系统及其控制需要在控制理论和计算机科学的界面上使用新的和专门的技术。一个主要的挑战是，这些系统可能（在逻辑上）非常庞大和复杂。例如，汽车按钮系统可能会进入数百万种不同的内部状态或逻辑配置。这可能会导致对控制工程设计所需的计算能力的几乎压倒性的要求。** **我们正在根据有效的架构原则开发正式的（即系统的和数学上严格的）方法来组织这样的系统。这样的系统架构可以是分层的，即将组件组组织成逻辑“层”，类似于企业或政府组织中的管理级别。在这里，每个关卡都接受上级的命令，并向下级发出控制命令，但同时也带有反馈链接，即特定关卡能够向上级报告有价值的表现数据。或者，可以将主要的系统组件**分布地组织成半自治的智能代理，通过网络进行相互通信。事实上，这种垂直和水平架构的许多变化和组合在实践中被采用。任何系统架构的目标都是使一个复杂的系统既透明（即人类可理解）又可计算（即可控制设计，保证系统按照规范运行）。我们的最终目标**是开发体系结构法则，以指导最适合给定控制任务的体系结构的选择。** **一个平行的研究目标是控制理论的内模原理（IMP）的扩展，根据该原理，一个“好的”控制器（在一定的技术意义上）**必须配备有关其环境的动态结构的特定智能。特别值得注意的是，如上所述，将IMP集成到离散事件系统的控制架构中。* * * *

Our proposed research lies in the branch of engineering and applied mathematics called automatic control or**sometimes cybernetics, namely the science and technology of feedback systems. Such systems are designed to maintain some critical **variable(s) within an acceptable range. For instance, an aircraft's automatic pilot corrects for wind disturbances which might otherwise**drive the plane off course, perhaps disastrously. Of specific interest to us are systems, such as traffic systems, which must respond to instantaneous**events, like the arrival at an intersection of a vehicle; and manufacturing systems, which must respond to a new part order or a machine breakdown.**Another example is the pushbutton system in an automobile which, though "randomly" activated by the motorist, should be designed never to fall into** a logical error like "hangup" or blocking.** **Such discrete-event systems and their control call for new and specialized techniques at the interface of control theory and computer science. A major challenge** is that these systems can be (logically) very large and complex. For instance, the automobile pushbutton system may potentially enter many millions of different internal** states or logical configurations. This may lead to almost overwhelming requirements on the computing power needed for control engineering design.** **We are developing formal (i.e. systematic and mathematically rigorous) methods of organizing such systems according to effective architectural principles.**Such a system architecture could be hierarchical, namely an organization of component groups into logical "layers", analogous to the levels of management **in a business or governmental organization. There each level takes orders from the one above, and issues control commands to the one below, but with **feedback links by which a given level can report valuable performance data to the level above. Alternatively one might organize the main system components** distributively into semi-autonomous smart agents that intercommunicate by networking. In fact many variations and combinations of such vertical and **horizontal architectures are employed in practice. The objective of any system architecture is to render a complex system both transparent (i.e. humanly**intelligible) and computable (i.e. amenable to control design which guarantees that the system will behave in accordance with specification). Our ultimate goal **is to develop laws of architecture to guide the choice of architecture best suited to a given control task.** **A parallel research goal is extension of the internal model principle (IMP) of control theory, according to which a "good" controller (in a certain technical sense) **must be equipped with specific intelligence concerning the dynamical structure of its environment. Of especial interest will be the incorporation of the IMP in**the control architectures of discrete-event systems as outlined above.** **