Distributed Observer and Controller Design for Linear Systems: A Separation-Based Approach

Abstract: This paper investigates the problem of consensus-based distributed control of linear time-invariant multi-channel systems subject to unknown inputs. A distributed observer-based control framework is proposed, within which observer nodes and controller nodes collaboratively perform state estimation and control tasks. Consensus refers to a distributed cooperative mechanism by which each observer node compares its state estimate with those of neighboring nodes, and use the resulting discrepancies to update its own state estimate. One key contribution of this work is to show that the distributed observers and the distributed controllers can be designed independently, which parallels the classical separation principle. This separability within the distributed framework is enabled by a discontinuous consensus strategy and two adaptive algorithms developed specifically for handling the unknown inputs. Theoretical analysis and numerical simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed framework in achieving state estimation, stabilization, and tracking control objectives.