Communication parameter design for networked control systems with the slotted ALOHA access protocol

This paper investigates the co-design problem of communication parameters and controller for a linear networked control system (NCS). The distributed sensors of the NCS communicate with the controller via a single wireless channel where a slotted ALOHA protocol with binary exponential backoff algorithm is used for media access control. The main contributions are two-fold: the lower bound of network throughput satisfying the mean square stability of the NCS is derived based on a designed feedback control gain; the other is that the key parameters of the slotted ALOHA protocol are designed so as to provide a viable media access control protocol for the sensors. Numerical examples are given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed design method and to further show the relationship between the communication part and the control part.