Compensating PDE actuator and sensor dynamics using Sylvester equation

Abstract: We consider the problem of stabilizing PDE-ODE cascade systems in which the input is applied to the PDE system whose output drives the ODE system. We also consider the dual problem of constructing an observer for ODE-PDE cascade systems in which the output of the ODE system drives the PDE system, whose output is measured. The PDE in these problems is stable and the ODE is unstable. While the ODE system models the plant in both the problems, the PDE system models the actuator in the stabilization problem and the sensor in the dual problem. In the literature, these problems have been solved for specific PDE models using the backstepping approach. In contrast, in the present work we consider these problems in an abstract framework by letting the PDE system be any regular linear system. Using a state transformation obtained by solving a Sylvester equation with unbounded operators, we first diagonalize the state operator corresponding to the cascade systems. We then solve the stabilization problem and the dual estimation problem, provided they are solvable, by solving certain finite-dimensional counterparts. We also derive necessary and sufficient conditions for verifying the solvability of these problems. We show that the controller which solves the stabilization problem is robust to certain unbounded perturbations. We illustrate our theory by designing a stabilizing controller for a PDE-ODE cascade in which the PDE is a 1D diffusion equation and an observer for a ODE-PDE cascade in which the PDE is a 1D wave equation.