Education/Tutorial Sessions
Education/Tutorial session proposals should address state-of-the-art control theory and industrial applications. Tutorials are encouraged to have panel discussions.

There are five tutorial sessions for the 2009 ACC:

• WeA02:  Control in Modern Printing Systems: Modular Reconfigurable Media Paths, Color Consistency, Fuser Process, and Registration
• WeC02 Tutorial Session: Applied Fractional Calculus in Controls
• ThA02: A Tutorial on the Control of Wind Turbines and Wind Farms
• ThB02: Bridging the Gap between Academia and Industry
• ThC02: Business and Bandwidth: A Tutorial on How Business and Use Models Affect Industrial Control Design

Follow the links below for more detailed information on each tutorial.

 

---

WeA02:  Control in Modern Printing Systems: Modular Reconfigurable
Media Paths, Color Consistency, Fuser Process, and Registration

Modern high-end printers are some of the most sophisticated devices in use today. In particular,
as a printer is essentially a “manufacturing system in a box,” control systems feature prominently
in printing systems, and a truly remarkable range of control techniques are employed. This tutorial
will cover real examples used in printing today and in the future, including: distributed control over
networks with delays, hybrid systems, nonholonomic systems, time-optimal control, feedback and
feedforward (two-degree-of-freedom) controllers, and Model Predictive Control (MPC).
(Click here for more information on the tutorial content, presenters, and schedule.)

---

WeC02: Tutorial Session: Applied Fractional Calculus in Controls

Why Fractional Calculus? Many real dynamic systems are better characterized using a noninteger
order dynamic model based on fractional calculus or, differentiation or integration of noninteger
order. Traditional calculus is based on integer order differentiation and integration. The
concept of fractional calculus has tremendous potential to change the way we see, model, and
control the nature around us. Denying fractional derivatives is like saying that zero, fractional, or
irrational numbers do not exist.
In the control side, clearly, for closed-loop control systems, there are four situations. They are 1)
IO (integer order) plant with IO controller; 2) IO plant with FO (fractional order) controller; 3) FO
plant with IO controller and 4) FO plant with FO controller. From control engineering point of view,
doing something better is the major concern. Existing evidences have confirmed that the best
fractional order controller outperforms the best integer order controller. It has also been answered
in the literature why to consider fractional order control even when integer (high) order control
works comparatively well. Fractional order PID controller tuning has reached to a matured state of
practical use. Since (integer-order) PID control dominates the industry, we believe FO-PID will
gain increasing impact and wide acceptance. Furthermore, we also believe that based on some
real world examples, fractional order control is ubiquitous when the dynamic system is of
distributed parameter nature.
The session, through a series of five talks will offer a tutorial of the emerging topic of “Applied
Fractional Calculus in Controls” with a snapshot of some recent new results. More information
can be found at http://fractionalcalculus.googlepages.com/
(Click here for more information on the tutorial content, presenters, and schedule.)

---

 

ThA02: A Tutorial on the Control of Wind Turbines and Wind Farms

Wind is recognized worldwide as a cost-effective, environmentally friendly solution to energy
shortages, and wind energy is currently the fastest-growing energy source in the world. Despite
the amazing growth in the installed capacity of wind turbines in recent years, engineering and
science challenges still exist. These large, flexible structures operate in uncertain environments
and lend themselves nicely to advanced control solutions. Advanced controllers can help achieve
the overall goal of decreasing the cost of wind energy by increasing the efficiency, and thus the
energy capture, or by reducing structural loading and increasing the lifetimes of the components
and turbine structures. This session will introduce the controls community to a number of issues
in wind power, and will outline many open problems in the areas of modeling and control of wind
turbines.
(Click here for more information on the tutorial content, presenters, and schedule.)

---

ThB02: Bridging the Gap between Academia and Industry

The use of a DCS with integrated online advanced controls, diagnostics, data analytics, and first
principle models is described for evaluating and demonstrating in an industrial environment the
benefits of innovative algorithms developed at universities. The examples will illustrate how
students and researchers can concentrate on the implementation of new control capabilities in
familiar tools such as Matlab while taking advantage of industrial PID, MPC, PCA, PLS, loop
monitoring, process modeling, and automated tuning tools without the need for special interfaces
programs, or training. The virtual plant capability in the DCS is capable of running faster than real
time and playing back plant data at extremely high speeds. The DCS, lab and pilot plant
equipment, and experimental setups are accessible wirelessly at the university and by companies
via internet. The system offers rapid exploration, discovery, prototyping, deployment,
demonstration, education, and recognition of university advancements in control.
(Click here for more information on the tutorial content, presenters, and schedule.)

---

ThC02: Business and Bandwidth: A Tutorial on How Business and
Use Models Affect Industrial Control Design

Students studying control problems often learn a lot of wondrous algorithms that impart near
mythical properties to the systems that they are applied to. At least this is how it works in theory
and simulation. In practice, however, a thorough understanding of the system, the use model,
and the market is often far more important than the differences between any two optimization
algorithms. Knowing when and where a particular algorithm is useful is typically at the heart of
real control problems. The session, through a series of four talks by presenters with deep industrial
experience, will describe a set of industrial control problems. These problems will provide context for
control designs. The participant will come to understand industrial control not as a problem of “how
to best optimize algorithm X” but of which of many algorithms can help in a practical way.
(Click here for more information on the tutorial content, presenters, and schedule.)

---