Constrained adaptive neural network control of an MIMO aeroelastic system with input nonlinearities

A constrained adaptive neural network control scheme is proposed for a multi-input and multi-output (MIMO) aeroelastic system in the presence of wind gust, system uncertainties, and input nonlinearities consisting of input saturation and dead-zone. In regard to the input nonlinearities, the right inverse function block of the dead-zone is added before the input nonlinearities, which simplifies the input nonlinearities into an equivalent input saturation. To deal with the equivalent input saturation, an auxiliary error system is designed to compensate for the impact of the input saturation. Meanwhile, uncertainties in pitch stiffness, plunge stiffness, and pitch damping are all considered, and radial basis function neural networks (RBFNNs) are applied to approximate the system uncertainties. In combination with the designed auxiliary error system and the backstepping control technique, a constrained adaptive neural network controller is designed, and it is proven that all the signals in the closed-loop system are semi-globally uniformly bounded via the Lyapunov stability analysis method. Finally, extensive digital simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed control scheme towards flutter suppression in spite of the integrated effects of wind gust, system uncertainties, and input nonlinearities.