IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO.
6, NOVEMBER 2010
Synthesis and Experimental Validation of the Novel
LQ-NEMCSI Adaptive Strategy on an
Electronic Throttle Valve
Mario di Bernardo, Senior Member, IEEE, Alessandro di Gaeta, Umberto Montanaro, and Stefania Santini
Abstract—This paper is concerned with the design of a novel
adaptive controller, namely the linear quadratic new extended
minimal control synthesis with integral action (LQ-NEMCSI).
We present for the first time the analytical proof of asymptotic
stability of the controller and experimental evidence of the algo-
rithm effectiveness for controlling an electronic throttle body: an
element of any drive-by-wire system in automotive engineering,
affected by many nonlinear perturbations.
Index Terms—Adaptive control, automotive control, mecha-
tronic, nonlinear control, piecewise smooth systems.
I. INTRODUCTION
I N MANY application areas a control action is aimed
at guaranteeing optimality with respect to a certain cost
function subject to some constraints. Optimal control schemes
are usually characterized by fixed control gains: a classical
approach is that of the well-known linear quadratic regulators
(LQR)[1]. It has been shown that, typically, LQ schemes lack
the flexibility and the structural stability of other more sophis-
ticated control approaches as, for instance, exemplified by the
two significant cases discussed in [2] and [3].
One way of achieving greater control flexibility is to use adap-
tive control schemes, where the control gains are appropriately
varied according to the system behavior. To address this issue, a
novel family of controllers was presented in [4], where the LQ
action is provided via an adaptive control strategy.
Here, we present a novel LQ-adaptive algorithm, namely the
linear quadratic new extended minimal control synthesis with
integral action (LQ-NEMCSI), which relies on minimal knowl-
edge of the plant. A simpler version of the algorithm can be
found in [4]. The proposed strategy is based on the standard
MCS algorithm [5] augmented with integral and robust control
actions, where the reference model is a nominal linear model
controlled by a classical LQ optimal strategy. In so doing, the
Manuscript received January 23, 2009; revised June 24, 2009. Manuscript
received in final form November 20, 2009. First published January 12, 2010;
current version published October 22, 2010. Recommended by Associate Editor
A. Giua.
M. di Bernardo, U. Montanaro, and S. Santini are with the Department
of Systems and Computer Engineering, University of Naples Federico II,
Naples 80125, Italy (e-mail: mario.dibernardo@unina.it; umberto.monta-
naro@unina.it; stsantin@unina.it).
A. di Gaeta is with the Istituto Motori, National Research Council, Naples
80125, Italy (e-mail: a.digaeta@im.cnr.it).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TCST.2009.2037610
1063-6536/$26.00 © 2010 IEEE
1325
controller has the benefits of the adaptive strategy, while also
matching the performance of the well known LQ regulator.
We found this novel approach particularly feasible to the con-
trol of an electronic throttle body (ETB). The ETB is a mecha-
tronic device dedicated to the regulation of the air mass flow
rate. In this system a shaped body duct regulates the relation-
ship between the angular position of the throttle valve and the
incoming air flow into the manifold. The desired plate position
is imposed by a microcomputer in a drive-by-wire configuration
(see, for example, [6] and [7]).
From the control perspective, the ETB is a highly nonlinear
and uncertain plant, since the transmission friction and the
return spring limp-home nonlinearity significantly affect the
system performance (see Section V for further details). Another
control requirement is the simplicity of the strategy that has
to be implemented on a typical low-cost automotive micro-
controller. For these reasons, we select the ETB control as a
significant and appropriate test problem to design and vali-
date, both numerically and experimentally, the LQ-NEMCSI
algorithm.
In the literature, many control schemes have been proposed
to solve the ETB control problem. Typically, they are aimed at
achieving a small tracking error with a rapid valve time opening
without overshoot. To solve the problem, often classical
controllers, for example those based on a proportional–inte-
gral–derivative (PID) structure [8]–[10], are used, but they are
equipped with some feed-forward action to compensate the
nonlinearities acting on the ETB. Existing compensators can
be divided in those which are model-based (see, for example,
[11], [12], and [13]) and those which are not (see [9]). Further
control techniques are based on constrained optimal control
[14] and hybrid approaches [13], [15]–[19], but again they are
based on a good knowledge of the plant dynamics.
With respect to the previous approaches, the adaptive law pro-
posed in this paper relies on minimal knowledge of the plant and
can be implemented easily without requiring time consuming
experiments for the precise characterization of the system non-
linear dynamics. Moreover, the robustness to unmodeled dy-
namics and parameter uncertainties is provided by the adaptive
gains of the LQ-NEMCSI strategy.
Here, we present for the first time experimental evidence
showing clearly that the novel scheme can guarantee excellent
tracking performance and transient behavior. All experiments
are performed by using a reliable experimental setup based on
a dSPACE control station.
1326 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO. 6, NOVEMBER 2010

II. BACKGROUND
The MCS algorithm was first introduced in [5] as an exten-
sion of the Landau model reference adaptive scheme [20]. It re-
lies on minimal knowledge of the plant dynamics. Namely, it is
assumed that the controlled system (plant) is controllable and it
has unknown parameters but a known phase canonical structure,
as

(1)

where , and

Fig. 1. Optimal reference minimal control synthesis.

.. .. .. .. ..
. . . . .
Note that typically the adaptive gains are started from zero, i.e.,
and in (4b) and (4d), respectively.
As shown in [5], the MCS controller can be proven to guar-
antee asymptotic stability of the error system and to be robust
with . against rapidly varying disturbances and unmodelled nonlinear
Notice that for the sake of clarity we will refer to a single perturbations [21], [22].
input system, but the MCS approach was shown to be effective In order to track the behavior of an LQ controlled system, the
also in controlling multiple-input–multiple-output (MIMO) sys- LQ-MCS scheme has been recently proposed as a viable alter-
tems [21]. native in [4]. Essentially, the LQ-MCS consists of implementing
The main aim of MCS control is for the plant states, , to the MCS scheme on the actual plant by selecting, as a reference
track asymptotically the states, , of a given asymptotically model, a nominal linear model of the plant controlled via a clas-
stable reference model of the form sical LQ strategy (i.e., choosing in Fig. 1 as an optimal
control input). In so doing, any mismatch between the nominal
(2) model and the real plant will be compensated by the adaptive
with , being some desired reference signal action of the MCS, which will also guarantee stability in those
and (Hurwitz matrix) and given in the same canon- cases where the LQ strategy alone would fail. It is possible to
ical form as that of the plant [5]. The MCS control input, say consider the LQ-MCS (shown in Fig. 1) as a simple way to con-
, consists of a feedforward and a feedback action with jugate the simplicity and optimality of the LQ action with the
time-varying adaptive gains defined as robustness of the MCS control.
The steps required to synthesize this control scheme are sum-
(3) marized in what follows.
1) Identify a nominal linear model of the plant of interest of
with the form

(4a) (8)

(4b) The model above represents a rough estimate of the plant

matrices that can be used to synthesize a classical optimal
(4c) control law.
2) Synthesize a classical LQ optimal controller on the nom-
(4d)
inal plant model selected above in order to minimize the
and and being positive scalar adaptation weights. The output target cost function, for example
error is computed as
(9)
(5)
with and being appropriate weight matrices.
where 3) Implement the LQ-MCS scheme by using the closed-loop
LQ nominal plant as the reference model for the MCS
(6a)
adaptive controller acting on the real plant.
(6b)
III. LQ-NEMCSI ALGORITHM
and is the solution of the Lyapunov equation
We now improve the previous LQ-MCS scheme by adding
(7) two further control actions according to the MCS philosophy
DI BERNARDO et al.: SYNTHESIS AND EXPERIMENTAL VALIDATION OF THE NOVEL LQ-NEMCSI ADAPTIVE STRATEGY 1327

[23], [24]. In particular, the general strategy is based on the

LQ-MCS control signal augmented by an explicit integral action
and switching action to enhance robustness. Note that the idea
of adding an extra switching action to compensate nonlinear dis-
turbances is inspired from variable-structure control approaches
for nonlinear systems as explained in [23], [25].
The control action provided by the new scheme, termed as
Fig. 2. Closed-loop error dynamics represented as an equivalent feedback
LQ-NEMCSI, is given as follows: system.

(10)
(19)
where is defined as in (3), whereas the two additional
terms are (20)
(21)
(11) (22)
(12) (23)

with The error dynamics (17) can be seen as a nonlinear system with
a linear feedforward block and a nonlinear feedback block ac-
(13) cording with the block scheme in Fig. 2.

B. Passivity of the Forward Dynamics

(14)
Consider now the feedforward path (see (17) and Fig. 2)
(15)

being the output matrix of the plant and the output error as
in (5). Notice that the weight has to be a positive scalar con- (24)
stant such as the weights and in the classical MCS. Further-
more, the additional adaptive gains and are initialized Since the dynamical system (24) has got a linear structure, to
to zero ( and ), such as prove its passivity it is sufficient to choose a positive definite
the standard gains and . We wish to emphasize that the quadratic storage function such as
resulting control law (10) is composed of both continuous (3),
(11), and discontinuous (12) actions. with (25)

A. Proof of Asymptotic Stability
Asymptotic stability of the LQ-NEMCSI algorithm is proven
using to the passivity theorem of Desoer and Vidyasagar [26].
The evolution of the tracking error defined as in (6a) can be
derived from the plant and model reference dynamics in (1) and
(2) under the switching control action in (10), as
(16)
where models rapidly varying dis-
turbances and unmodelled nonlinear perturbations acting on the
plant. We remark that the matrix is the closed-loop dynamic
matrix of the LTI reference model (8) under the action of the LQ
strategy. After simple algebraic manipulations, given the canon-
ical form of matrices and , we can rewrite (16) as
Using (7), (5), (6b), and (18), the time derivative of the storage
function can be now computed as
(26)
as the matrix is positive definite. In so doing, passivity of
the feedforward system is proven [27]. Notice that, since
is asymptotically stable according to the classical theory on LQ
control theory, the Lyapunov (7) always has a solution [1].
C. Passivity of the Feedback Dynamics
To prove that the feedback block will only ever produce a
finite amount of energy, the Popov’s inequality must be satisfied.
Specifically, the following integral inequality must hold [26]:
(27)

(17) for all where is a finite constant independent of

. Decomposing the Popov’s integral (27) as
where
(28)
(18)
1328 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO. 6, NOVEMBER 2010

where

(29)

(30)

then condition (27) is verified if each of the integral terms,

and , are greater than some finite negative quantities, say
and .
Consider now the first integral term (29). The MCS adapta-
tion law is (see (19))

(31)

with

(32) Fig. 3. (a) Picture of motorized throttle body (DV-E5, Bosch). (b) Schematic
of the electronic throttle body.
where the integral and proportional adaptive components are,
respectively
with the inequality (35). In so doing, passivity of the feedback
(33) path is proven.
Remarks:
Thus, by using the above expressions, in (29) can be decom- • For any time instant the bounded input-output prop-
posed as erty of the feedback passive systems guarantees bounded-
ness of the error dynamics [21].
• The convergence of the adaptive gain to a finite value
in the absence of persistent perturbations can be easily
shown by following the approach in [25]. In practice,
might keep growing if persistent disturbances are present.
In this case, a simple implementation solution is to lock the
evolution of over a certain threshold.

IV. EXPERIMENTAL CASE OF STUDY: THE ELECTRONIC

(34)
THROTTLE BODY

which is greater than a negative definite constant. The ETB [see Fig. 3(a)] is a mechatronic device dedicated to
Consider now the term (30), where . We the regulation of the air mass flow rate of an internal combus-
have now to prove that tion engine. It is located between the air filter box and the in-
take manifold. When the throttle plate opens an airflow sensor
detects this change and communicates it to the electronic con-
(35)
trol unit (ECU). As a consequence, ECU varies the amount of
injected fuel in order to maintain the desired air-fuel ratio.
This is verified if , and this The reference signal is the solution of a trade off between
is trivially satisfied if the driver request (acceleration pedal position) and the effec-
tive traction possibilities depending upon driveability, safety
(36) and emission constraints. The control signal generated by the
ECU becomes, by means of an H-bridge power converter, the
From the definition of the adaptation law for the in (15), armature voltage of a dc-motor. The rotation motion is then
it is apparent that the gain evolution is monotonously increasing. transferred from the motor shaft to the plate shaft through a gear
Thus, for any given constant value , there always exists a system. A schematic of the ETB is shown in Fig. 3(b). Despite
finite time instant, say , such that for all . If its apparent simplicity, the system behavior is affected by many
we now set and , we can conclude that, nonlinearities which can dramatically alter its dynamics. They
for all , the passivity condition (36) is verified together can be briefly summarized as follows.
DI BERNARDO et al.: SYNTHESIS AND EXPERIMENTAL VALIDATION OF THE NOVEL LQ-NEMCSI ADAPTIVE STRATEGY 1329

Fig. 4. Experimental stick and slip phenomena: armature voltage (dashed line)
Fig. 5. Experimental hysteresis phenomenon: experimental data from the plant
and plate position (solid line). Notice that, for the comparison of the time history
(dotted line) and average data (solid line).
of both the variables on the same plot, the armature voltage is multiplied by 10).

• Piece-Wise Linear Restoring Torque. When a failure of the

dc motor occurs, for safety reasons it is necessary to en-
sure that the valve comes back to a default position (called
limp-home position) [28]. To guarantee the limp-home,
two additional springs are used. The resulting elastic torque
is a piece-wise linear function of all the admissible angles.
• Friction. The friction is mainly due to the low quality of
the bearings.
• Impacts. Impacts occur when the plate hits the mechanical
constraints.
• Backlash. This effect is due to a spacing between the gear
teeth.
Another important issue is the uncertainty on the system param-
eter values due to manufacturing tolerances, variable operating
conditions or mechanical wear [7].

A. Experimental Nonlinear Behavior
Using the setup described in appendix A, it has been possible
to capture and confirm experimentally the nonlinear behavior
exhibited by the throttle body.
A notable consequence of friction is the presence of stick-slip
behavior. When this kind of unwanted dynamics appear, rigid
body elements alternatively stick and slip with respect to each
other.
The experimental stick-slip oscillations exhibited by the
throttle valve are shown in Fig. 4 under an open-loop slowly
varying armature voltage.
The combined action of friction and spring torques causes an
hysteretic behavior in the system response (see Fig. 5) [11], [29].
When the throttle body dynamics are controlled via the feed-
back of the angular position of the plate, other relevant nonlinear
effects appear. For instance, it is well known that in systems with
friction under an integral control action (like PID controller),
an equilibrium (set point) can be easily transformed into a limit
cycle when the parameters change. This undesired phenomenon
Fig. 6. Experimental phase plot showing the hunting phenomenon under a PI
control action (the integral gain is 0.05, the proportional gain is 0.1 and reference
signal is 45 [deg]).
is known in the literature as hunting [11], [30], [31]. Experi-
mental results show that this is an important nonlinear phenom-
enon since the controlled angular plate position exhibits an un-
wanted limit cycle in the presence of a constant reference signal
(see Fig. 6).
Notice that, since tuning of the controller is a crucial aspect
of the design, an adaptive strategy is worthwhile exploring.
B. Performances of the ETB via Classical Controller
In this section, we experimentally investigate the perfor-
mance achievable via a properly tuned PI controller equipped
with a model based feed-forward action for the compensation
of nonlinear dynamics. A filter is added on the reference signal
to limit the tracking error during rapid tip-in/tip-out maneuvers.
Further details on control design can be found in [32].
1330 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO. 6, NOVEMBER 2010
Fig. 7. Experimental results, PI with a model-based feed-forward action: 
reference plate position (dashdotted blue line);  filtered reference signal to
be tracked (dashed red line);  angular plate position (solid black line), when
the reference is a: (a) square wave with period 4 [s] and amplitude of 5 [deg]
around 27 [deg]; (b) a step of 55 [deg]; (c) constant at 45 [deg] for long time; (d)
a sinusoidal wave with period 3 [s] and amplitude of 25 [deg] around 50 [deg].
Fig. 7 highlights that the PI is not effective in some cases due
to the presence of nonlinearities. In particular: 1) the friction
torque heavily increases the tracking error when the reference
signal is a square wave [see Fig. 7(a) and (b)], especially in the
case of small amplitude signals as in Fig. 7(a); 2) in the case
of low velocities the plate gets stuck because of friction, as in
Fig. 7(d); 3) the presence of hunting phenomenon is unavoid-
able, as in Fig. 7(c).
V. SYNTHESIS OF THE LQ-NEMCSI FOR ETB CONTROL
A. Control Specifications
The achievable control specifications obviously depend
on the admissible performance of the adopted hardware (see
Appendix A). Essentially they are related to requirements on
the system dynamic response and they are set as follows:
1) the settling time is required to be 130 [ms] for a valve
opening [7] (notice that the settling time is defined as the
minimum time after which the throttle plate angle remains
within 5% of its steady-state value);
2) no overshoot should be present in the step response (fur-
thermore, the throttle plate shall never hit the mechanical
end-stroke);
3) the maximum value of the steady state tracking error is set
to be 0.1 [deg] [9];
4) the maximum absolute dynamic error should be 7 [deg] [7].
Furthermore the control system should be robust to variations
of the process parameters, and the controller synthesis should
be simple and automated as much as possible [15].
B. Design of the LQ Controlled Reference Model
As only minimal knowledge of the plant is required for the
control synthesis, the first step is the choice of an approximate
LTI model of the ETB. This can be found mainly in two different
ways: 1) using a standard linear identification procedure and 2)
simplifying a more complete nonlinear model of the plant (when
it is available).
In industrial applications, the first approach can be preferable.
Specifically, it is assumed that the throttle body is described by
a classical rotational mass-spring-damping model, as
(37)
where ; [deg] and [deg/s] are the angular
plate position and velocity, respectively. Classical identification
methods, e.g., LS algorithms, can then be used to tune the model
parameters , , and .
Obviously, if a detailed nonlinear model is available, its
simplified version can be used for model reference design.
Here, according with a nonlinear plant model previously de-
rived for analysis and numerical simulation purposes [32] (see
Appendix B for further details), the following simplified model
has been used for the control synthesis:
where , [V] is the armature voltage of the
dc motor, [Kgm ] is the total moment of inertia, [Nm/A]
is the dc motor torque constant, [Nm/deg] is the equivalent
DI BERNARDO et al.: SYNTHESIS AND EXPERIMENTAL VALIDATION OF THE NOVEL LQ-NEMCSI ADAPTIVE STRATEGY 1331

stiffness due to the restoring springs and [deg/rad]

is a dimensional constant.
Once the nominal model has been selected, it is necessary to
synthesize a classical LQ optimal controller for the reference
model. The weight matrices, and
, have been found heuristically, so as to achieve the desired
settling time of 130 [ms].
Note that the presence of bounded uncertainties in the
model parameters and unmodelled nonlinear dynamics can be
regarded as time varying disturbances acting on the plant (see
Section IV and [21]). This term has been checked to satisfy
the matching conditions requirements of the MCS approach as
shown in Appendix B.

C. Details on the Implementation of the LQ-NEMCSI Strategy

In implementing the control action (12), the following issues
have to be considered.
1) The presence of the switching function in (12) introduces
chattering (high frequency switching of the control signal).
In order to avoid this unwanted phenomena, the discontin-
uous control action can be smoothed as [23]

(38)

where is a sufficiently small positive constant to be ap-
propriately chosen.
2) A smooth trajectory reference (STR) first-order filter is
introduced both to limit the tracking error during tip-in/
tip-out conditions and to reduce the unavoidable noise on
the external reference [7].
3) As the velocity of the plate is not available, a proper deriva-
tive filter has to be used to reconstruct the plate velocity.
In so doing, unavoidable noise and delays are introduced
in the closed-loop system along the velocity channel wors-
ening the overall performances. A way to overcome this
problem is to use state observers for the velocity estima-
tion according with some approaches that can be found in
the ETB literature (see, for example, [16], [19], [28], [33]).
Since one of the most strict industrial requirements is the
reduction of the processing time and memory needed for
the implementation of controllers on an ECU [15], here we
test the control scheme assuming in (4a) equal to zero,
removing in this way the need for an online estimation of
the angular velocity. The experimental results confirm that
such an “unorthodox” choice does not affect the overall
performance of the controller.
4) As it usually happens when implementing the MCS
strategy [21], the scalar quantities and which modu-
late the adaptive gains in (4a) and (4c), have to be chosen
heuristically as a trade off between convergence time and
reactivity of the control action. Our choice for the weights
of the adaptive strategy is , , , controller does indeed guarantee good tracking performance in
and . these operating conditions, as shown in Fig. 9. Note that the
5) Locking of the adaptive gains was implemented in the mi-
crocontroller. In particular, the adaptive gain is frozen
when it exceeds 25% of the maximum allowable voltage
value, i.e., battery voltage.
Fig. 8. Experimental results. Square wave with period 4 [s] and amplitude 50
[deg]. Angular plate position:  plate position reference (dashdotted blue line);
 plate position reference model to be tracked (dashed red line);  plate
position (solid black line). (a) begin of the manoeuvre t 2 [20; 33] [s]; (b) end
of the manoeuvre t 2 [113:5; 126:5] [s].
VI. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
The proposed adaptive LQ-NEMCSI controller has been
widely tested over a long reference signal of the throttle po-
sition composed by a mixed sequence of canonical signals,
comprising square, sinusoidal, and step functions as well as
free driver commands.
To illustrate the effects of the gain adaptation on the tracking
error, we show in Fig. 8(a) and (b) the reference position and
the valve position close to the beginning of the test and after
about 100 [s]. We can clearly see that, as time increases, the
control gains evolve causing a better and better tracking of the
reference model state. Specifically, the undershoot present at
the beginning of the maneuver disappears as the controller gain
adapt.
We present next a set of wide opening manoeuvres where
the valve is required to open and close over a position range
of about 70 [deg]. This is a particularly challenging problem
as the restoring force is, in practice, characterized by different
elastic coefficients depending on the actual position of the plate
(see Appendix B). Despite the lack of any explicit modelling
of such spring behavior, experiments confirm that the adaptive
maximum transient error is below 7 [deg] as required and goes
down to less than 0.1 [deg] at steady-state. The corresponding
control signal and gain evolution are within the acceptable ex-
perimental bounds.
1332 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO. 6, NOVEMBER 2010

Fig. 9. Experimental results. Square wave with period 4 [s] and amplitude Fig. 10. Experimental results. Sinusoidal wave with period 4 [s] and ampli-
70 [deg]. (a) Angular plate position:  plate position reference (dashdotted 
tude 5 [deg]. (a) Angular plate position: plate position reference (dashdotted
blue line);  plate position reference model to be tracked (dashed red line); blue line); plate position reference model to be tracked (dashed red line);
 plate position (solid black line). (b) Position tracking error. (c) Controller  plate position (solid black line). (b) Position tracking error. (c) Controller
adaptive gains:K K
(solid line), (dashed-dotted line). (d) Controller output adaptive gains: K K
(solid line), (dashed-dotted line). (d) Controller output
voltage. voltage.

We move now to the case of small amplitude reference signals. scheme copes effectively with such unwanted nonlinear perturba-
In this scenario the presence of stick-slip motion due to friction tions (which again are not modelled explicitly for control system
becomes particularly relevant as the position and velocity vari- design). Similar results were obtained for different small ampli-
ations are relatively low. As shown in Fig. 10 our novel control tude signals and are not reported here for the sake of brevity.
DI BERNARDO et al.: SYNTHESIS AND EXPERIMENTAL VALIDATION OF THE NOVEL LQ-NEMCSI ADAPTIVE STRATEGY
Fig. 11. Experimental results. Free driver command. (a) Angular plate posi-
tion:  plate position reference (dashdotted blue line);  plate position ref-
erence model to be tracked (dashed red line);  plate position (solid black
line). (b) Position tracking error. (c) Controller adaptive gains: K (solid line),
K (dashed-dotted line). (d) Controller output voltage.
Further validation of the controller was carried out on a
set of free manoeuvres as shown in Fig. 11. We observe
1333
Fig. 12. Experimental results. Sequence of steps. (a) Angular plate position:
 plate position reference (dashdotted blue line); plate position reference
model to be tracked (dashed red line);  plate position (solid black line).
(b) Position tracking error. (c) Controller adaptive gains: K K
(solid line),
(dashed-dotted line). (d) Controller output voltage.
that excellent tracking performance is achieved when more
realistic free driver commands are chosen as reference signals.
In particular, for the manoeuvre Fig. 11(a) details on the
1334 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO. 6, NOVEMBER 2010
evolution of absolute tracking error, adaptive gains and control
action are traced in Fig. 11(b)–(d), respectively. The tracking
error during all the manoeuvre is less than the one prescribed
by automotive requirements (7 [deg]) remaining lower than
about 2.6 [deg].
Finally, we consider the case of a multistep reference signal
applied to the valve towards the end of the control horizon.
Such signal is shown in Fig. 12. Here, again the LQ-NEMCSI
controller guarantees satisfactory performance over the entire
manoeuvre.
All the validation tests described above confirm that indeed
the new adaptive control scheme presented in this paper is a vi-
able and effective strategy to be implemented experimentally
showing excellent performance when applied to the ETB setup
of interest. Note that for the sake of brevity, we omit the evolu-
tion of the adaptive gains and determining the amplitude
of the integral and switching actions in the LQ-NEMCSI con-
troller for all the experimental tests which have been reported. In
general, we observe the switching action to have small bounded
amplitude and similarly for the integral action.
It is worth mentioning here that performing a long ma-
noeuvre can be useful to implement an automatic procedure
for the tuning of the controller gains. Namely, the gains could
be set to the final steady-state values obtained at the end of
the manoeuvre and then adapted about those values to cope
with uncertainties and external disturbances. Despite not being
a requirement of the algorithm we presented in the paper,
this might represent a practical low-cost alternative to more
classical gain tuning schemes.
VII. CONCLUSION
We have presented the synthesis and validation of a novel
class of adaptive controllers, the LQ-NEMCSI. The main fea-
tures of these controllers are to require minimal knowledge of
the plant and to be robust to nonlinear perturbations by means
of an adaptively estimated switching action. The controller is
based on the family of MCS model reference adaptive con-
trollers. The idea is to use an optimally controlled reference
model and implement the control action onto the plant by means
of an adaptive controller consisting of state feedback and feed-
forward actions enhanced by means of a switching action and
an integral action. Analytical proof of asymptotic stability was
given. Then, the controller was validated experimentally on a
highly nonlinear plant of relevance in applications, the ETB.
The experimental validation confirms the effectiveness of the
novel scheme to achieve the desired performance in a number
of different situations.
Note that the control design and validation reported in this
paper strongly indicates the feasibility of the new control
strategy we presented for the control of ETB and other non-
linear plants in commercial applications. Future work will
address this issue.
APPENDIX A
EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
The experimental setup consists of: 1) an ETB (DV-E5,
Bosch), embedding a dc motor; 2) two dual resistive angular
position sensors; 3) a battery voltage sensor; 4) an H-bridge
power circuit (to drive the DC motor); 5) an Hall effect current
sensor (LTA 50P/SP1, LEM); 6) signal conditioning circuits;
7) a station for rapid control prototyping (RCP).
The open-loop response of the ETB plant can be summarized
through two characteristic times. Namely, the time necessary
to open wide the valve under a battery voltage step (
12 [V]) 100 [ms], and the current-less return time,
namely the time necessary to close the valve in free evolution
350 [ms].
The RCP is a dSPACE-based Multiprocessor System
equipped with the DS1003 (DSP TMS320C40, 60 Mflops)
and DS1004 (DEC Alpha AXP 21164, 600 Mflops) processor
boards. An analog DS2201 (20 ch., 12 bit, 30 kHz) and a
digital DS4002 (8 ch. CAP/CMP res. 30 bit/200 ns, freq.
max. 833 kHz) board allow the I/O handling. The DSP is
programmed in MATLAB/Simulink (MathWorks) environment
[34] and the experiments are managed and instrumented by a
ControlDesk application [35]. Furthermore, an oscilloscope
(TDS-3014, Tektronix) is used to perform high frequency
measurements.
Note that, using the hardware described above, the execution
of our control task is performed in 10 [ s] with a sample time
of 1 [ms].
APPENDIX B
MATHEMATICAL MODEL OF THE THROTTLE BODY
The ETB plant (shown in Fig. 3) mainly consists of a dc
motor, a reduction gear and a plate where the springs necessary
to lead the plate in the limp-home position are also located.
The mathematical model of the plant can be constructed
starting from the simple models that describe each part of the
system and then considering the interaction between them. The
overall model can then be derived as (see [36] for details on the
model derivation)
(39)
where, given the minimum and the maximum allowed angles,
respectively and , [deg] is the plate
position; [deg/s] is the velocity of the plate; is the current
across the coil of the armature; [V] is the
voltage source across the coil of the armature (being the
battery voltage); [H] is the equivalent inductance of the ar-
mature coil; [ ] is the equivalent resistance of the armature
coil; [Vs/rad] is the velocity constant determined by the flux
of the permanent magnets; [Nm/A] is the torque constant;
[Kgm ] is the equivalent moment of inertia; is the transmis-
sion ratio due to the gear; [Nm] is the torque due to the pres-
ence of the springs which gives the restoring torque; [Nm]
represents all friction torques. Parameter values for our experi-
mental setup are reported in Table I.
Nonlinear Restoring Torque and Friction: The elastic
torque in (39), is not simply a linear function of all the
DI BERNARDO et al.: SYNTHESIS AND EXPERIMENTAL VALIDATION OF THE NOVEL LQ-NEMCSI ADAPTIVE STRATEGY 1335

TABLE I
ETB MODEL PARAMETERS

admissible angles, but is a PWL (piece-wise linear) function

given by

if
if
(40)
if
if
(41a)
(41b)
(41c)

where , , [Nm/deg] are the stiffness coefficients in

each region of interest; [Nm] is the minimum torque nec-
essary to close the valve; [Nm] is the minimum torque
necessary to open the valve; [deg] is the limp-home an- Fig. 13. Experimental restoring torque: (a) plate position greater than the limp-
gular position; [deg] is the clearance between the teeth of home; (b) plate position lower than the limp home.
the gear; [deg] is the discontinuity point of the slope of the
elastic torque. Further details on the experimental derivation of
expression (40) in the range of interest is reported in [36], while Rearranging the Model Equations: We now rearrange (39)
all parameter values are given in Table I. The identified elastic in order to put the system in the form prescribed to show the
torque model is shown in Fig. 13. robustness of the MCS approach [25] (see Section IV).
The model of the friction torque is based on a static Coulomb Since the electrical dynamics are faster than the mechanical
model modified in order to include the Stribeck effect as ones, we can neglect the dynamic of the current, thus yielding

where [Nm] is the Coulomb friction torque; [Nm] is the (42)

stiction friction torque; [deg/s] is the Stribeck velocity
[Nms/rad] is the equivalent linear damping coefficient. where the current is a static function of the armature voltage
Fig. 14 shows the shape of the friction nonlinear term when and angular velocity of the plate as
the friction parameters have been set according to those in
Table I. Further details can be found in [32], [36], while the
parameters values are reported in Table I. (43)
1336 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON CONTROL SYSTEMS TECHNOLOGY, VOL. 18, NO. 6, NOVEMBER 2010

Define now the state and the input vectors as

, , and the parameters vector.
System (49) can be written as

(50)

where

(51)

Considering now the parameter uncertainties , assumed to be

bounded, system (50) can be recast as

(52)
Fig. 14. Nonlinear term of the friction torque based on identified plant param-
eters. with

(53)
Now we rewrite the spring torque as
where and
(44) . Note that, since the parameter uncertainties
if , and the values of the physical parameter are bounded, the
function is also be bounded as required in [25].
if
(45)
if ,
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1337
Mario di Bernardo (S’06) received the Ph.D. degree
in engineering mathematics from the University of
Bristol, Bristol, U.K., in 1998.
He is currently an Associate Professor with the
Department of Automatic Control, University of
Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy. He was appointed
to a Lectureship with the Department of Engineering
Mathematics, University of Bristol, in 1997, and then
promoted to a Readership and a Full Professorship.
From 2001 to 2003, he was an Assistant Professor
with the Department of Automatic Control, Univer-
sity of Sannio, Sannio, Italy. His research interests include the broad area of
nonlinear systems, on both dynamics and control. He authored and coauthored
more than 150 international scientific publications.
Dr. Bernardo is currently Associate Editor of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON
CIRCUITS AND SYSTEMS—I: REGULAR PAPERS. He is a member of the orga-
nizing committees of the IEEE Symposia on Circuits and Systems and has been
chair or co-chair of many scientific events. In 2004, he was elected to the gov-
erning board of the Italian Society for Chaos and Complexity and in 2006 and
2009 to the Board of Governors of the IEEE Circuits and Systems Society. He re-
ceived funding from major funding bodies and industries including the EPSRC,
the European Union, the Italian Ministry of Research and University, Jaguar En-
gineering Centre, QinetiQ. On the 28th February 2007, he was honoured with
the title of ’Cavaliere della Repubblica Italiana’ (equivalent to a British OBE)
for scientific merits by the President of the Italian Republic.
Alessandro di Gaeta received the “Laurea” degree
(M.Sc.) in computer science engineering and the
Ph.D. degree in automatic control from the Univer-
sity of Naples “Federico II”, Naples, Italy, in 1999
and 2002, respectively.
Since 2003, he has been a Researcher with the
Istituto Motori of the National Research Council of
Italy, Naples, Italy, where he is presently with the
High Efficiency Spark Ignition Engines Division.
His research interests include modeling and control
of internal combustion engines and of mechatronic
systems.
Umberto Montanaro received the “Laurea” degree
(M.Sc.) in computer science engineering and the
Ph.D. degree in automatic control from the Univer-
sity of Naples Federico II, Naples, Italy, in 2005 and
2009, respectively.
His research interests include the modeling of non-
smooth systems, adaptive, and switching control.
Stefania Santini received the “Laurea” degree
(M.Sc.) in control engineering and the Ph.D. degree in
automatic control from the University of Naples Fed-
erico II, Naples, Italy, in 1996 and 1999, respectively.
In 1999, she was a Visiting Researcher with
the Measurement and Control Laboratory (ETH
Zuerich), Svizzera. In 2001, she became Assistant
Professor of Automatic Control with the Department
of Systems and Computer Engineering, University
of Naples Federico II. Her current research interests
include the analysis and control of nonsmooth
dynamical systems and automotive control.
Dr. Santini is a member of the Technical Committee on Automotive Controls
of the IEEE Control System Society.