Approximate Optimal Trajectory Tracking for Continuous Time Nonlinear Systems

TL;DR

This paper develops a control method for continuous nonlinear systems that guarantees bounded trajectory tracking and convergence to an approximate optimal policy, extending dynamic programming techniques to tracking problems.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach to solve optimal tracking for continuous nonlinear systems using approximate dynamic programming, addressing a previously open problem.

Findings

Guarantees bounded tracking of desired trajectories.

Ensures convergence to an approximate optimal policy.

Extends dynamic programming to nonlinear tracking problems.

Abstract

Approximate dynamic programming has been investigated and used as a method to approximately solve optimal regulation problems. However, the extension of this technique to optimal tracking problems for continuous time nonlinear systems has remained a non-trivial open problem. The control development in this paper guarantees ultimately bounded tracking of a desired trajectory, while also ensuring that the controller converges to an approximate optimal policy.