Optimal estimation and control at scale

PI: Richard Pates (LU); co-PI: Anders Hansson (LiU)

Many classical optimal methods for estimation and control have provable robustness and performance guarantees that can enhance the sustainability and resilience of engineering systems. However, their implementation typically requires all-to-all communication of sensor measurements, making them an infeasible choice for many practical applications. The aim of the project is to systematically investigate optimal estimation and control approaches through the lens of sparse linear algebra. In particular, the project aims to exploit techniques from sparse linear algebra to reduce the communication burden of classical optimal estimation and control methods. Reducing the need for communication will allow these methods to be applied in important sensor rich application areas, such as autonomous vehicles, transportation networks, and power grids. This has the potential to greatly improve energy efficiency and resilience in these applications, where suboptimal design approaches, that typically provide no formal guarantees, must currently be used for reasons of system scale.

Project number: D10