Innovative Techniques for the Control of Linear and Nonlinear Systems and Processes

A special issue of Processes (ISSN 2227-9717). This special issue belongs to the section "AI-Enabled Process Engineering".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 28 February 2026 | Viewed by 1653

Special Issue Editors


E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Unidad Profesional Interdisciplinaria de Ingeniería Campus Hidalgo, Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Carretera Pachuca—Actopan Kilómetro 1+500, Distrito de Educación, Salud, Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación, San Agustín Tlaxiaca 42162, Mexico
Interests: multi-agent systems; wheeled mobile robots; aerial robots; collision avoidance; formation control; petri nets; discrete-event systems

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Mecatronics Department, Universidad Politécnica de Pachuca, Carr. Pachuca-Cd. Sahagún km 20, Ex-Hacienda de Santa Bárbara, Zempoala 43830, Hidalgo, Mexico
Interests: Takagi–Sugeno models; linear matrix inequalities; control theory; convex modeling; Lyapunov theory

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
InIAT Instituto de Investigación Aplicada y Tecnología, Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico City 01219, Mexico
Interests: robust control of linear and nonlinear systems

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor Assistant
1. Unidad Profesional Interdisciplinaria de Ingeniería Alejo Peralta, Instituto Politécnico Nacional, C. 11 Sur 12122, San Francisco Mayorazgo, Puebla 72480, Mexico
2. Unidad Profesional Interdisciplinaria de Ingeniería Campus Hidalgo, Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Carretera Pachuca—Actopan Kilómetro 1+500, Distrito de Educación, Salud, Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación, San Agustín Tlaxiaca 42162, Mexico
Interests: development and study of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs); design of control systems for UAVs; nonlinear control of systems; underactuated systems; control of autonomous marine systems

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The exponential growth of science and technology has enabled the development and incorporation of robotic and mechatronic systems into various industrial and service processes. Today, this technology is combined with intelligent systems, generating a paradigm shift in the industrial sector and offering innovative solutions for various applications demanded by the industry. 

This integration necessitates the development of innovative control techniques that enhance the quality, productivity, and robustness of industrial processes. Similarly, the evolution from Industry 4.0 to 5.0 demands that different processes be sustainable, flexible, connected to the cloud, and equipped with advanced automation to make them more efficient, clean, safe, and optimal while facilitating informed decision-making. Some of these applications include material handling and transportation, industrial automation, precision agriculture, medicine and rehabilitation, collaborative robotics, artificial intelligence, human–robot interactions, and digital twins, among others. 

It is essential to note that these systems frequently operate under highly variable conditions, which makes modeling and predicting their behavior challenging. Thus, it is evident that innovative control strategies are required, specifically designed to ensure control objectives despite linear or nonlinear dynamics, sensitivity to exogenous disturbances, and the complexity of process systems.

Based on the above, this Special Issue aims to present high-quality articles related to the design, development, and implementation of innovative control techniques for the following systems or processes (but are not limited to):

  • Aerospace;
  • AI-enabled Engineering;
  • Agriculture;
  • Biological;
  • Chemical;
  • Energy;
  • Environmental;
  • Flexible Manufacturing Systems;
  • Food Process Engineering;
  • Human–Robot Interactions;
  • Materials;
  • Mechatronics;
  • Monitoring and Internet of Things;
  • Pharmaceuticals;
  • Process Control and Automation;
  • Robotics;
  • Smart mobility;
  • Sustainability.

Prof. Dr. Jaime González-Sierra
Prof. Dr. Víctor Estrada-Manzo
Dr. Mario Ramírez-Neria
Guest Editors

Dr. Yair Lozano-Hernández
Guest Editor Assistant

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Processes is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • linear and nonlinear control
  • robotics
  • manufacturing processes
  • fault-tolerant control
  • extended state observers
  • underactuated systems
  • discrete-event systems
  • sustainability
  • process control

Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue

  • Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
  • Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
  • Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
  • External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
  • Reprint: MDPI Books provides the opportunity to republish successful Special Issues in book format, both online and in print.

Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.

Published Papers (2 papers)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

23 pages, 6879 KB  
Article
Performance, Fragility and Robustness for a Class of Quasi-Polynomials of Degree Two
by Raúl Villafuerte-Segura, Guillermo Oaxaca-Adams, Gilberto Ochoa-Ortega and Mario Ramirez-Neria
Processes 2025, 13(9), 2749; https://doi.org/10.3390/pr13092749 - 28 Aug 2025
Viewed by 167
Abstract
In recent years the use of delayed controllers has increased considerably, since they can attenuate noise, replace derivative actions, avoid the construction of observers, and reduce the use of extra sensors, while maintaining inherent insensitivity to high-frequency noise. Therefore, it is important to [...] Read more.
In recent years the use of delayed controllers has increased considerably, since they can attenuate noise, replace derivative actions, avoid the construction of observers, and reduce the use of extra sensors, while maintaining inherent insensitivity to high-frequency noise. Therefore, it is important to continue improving the tuning of these controllers, including properties such as performance, fragility and robustness that may be beneficial for this purpose. However, currently most studies prioritize tuning using only the performance property, some others only the fragility property, and some less only the robustness property. This work provides the first rigorous joint analysis of performance, fragility, and robustness for a class of systems whose characteristic equation is a quasi-polynomial of degree two, filling a gap in the current literature. Thus, necessary and sufficient conditions are proposed to improve the tuning of delayed-action controllers by ensuring a exponential decay rate on the convergence of the closed-loop system response (performance) and by ensuring stabilization and/or trajectory tracking in the face of changes in system parameters (robustness) and controllers gains (fragility). To illustrate and corroborate the effectiveness of the proposed theoretical results, a real-time implementation is presented on a mobile prototype consisting of an omnidirectional mobile robot, to streamline/guarantee trajectory tracking in response to variations in controller gains and robot parameters. This implementation and application of theoretical results are possible thanks to the proposal of a novel delayed nonlinear controller and some simple but strategic algebraic manipulations that reduce the original problem to the study of a quasi-polynomial of degree 9 with three commensurable delays. Finally, our results are compared with a classical proportional nonlinear controller showing that our proposal is relevant. Full article
Show Figures

Figure 1

28 pages, 1980 KB  
Article
Development of Nonlinear Six-Degree-of-Freedom Dynamic Modelling and High-Fidelity Flight Simulation of an Autonomous Airship
by Muhammad Wasim, Ahsan Ali and Muhammad Umer Sohail
Processes 2025, 13(9), 2688; https://doi.org/10.3390/pr13092688 - 24 Aug 2025
Viewed by 661
Abstract
An airship is a lighter-than-air vehicle that offers static lift without consuming much power. This property makes it a potential candidate for many commercial applications. The target applications include rescue operations, surveillance, communication, a data collection platform for research activities and payload delivery [...] Read more.
An airship is a lighter-than-air vehicle that offers static lift without consuming much power. This property makes it a potential candidate for many commercial applications. The target applications include rescue operations, surveillance, communication, a data collection platform for research activities and payload delivery that requires hovering capabilities, etc. To successfully apply airships in these applications and many others, airship autonomous control development is of paramount importance. To accomplish this goal, the initial step is to model airship dynamics that cover the complete flight envelope accurately. The goal is to develop a flight simulator that can test the advanced autonomous control algorithms. In the proposed work, first, the nonlinear six-degree-of-freedom equations of motion are developed using Newtonian mechanics. These equations are used to develop a flight simulator for the University of Engineering and Technology Taxila (UETT) airship. Airship responses to different control inputs are investigated, and the results are validated with the available data in the literature for other airship projects. Also, the obtained longitudinal and lateral eigenmodes show good agreement with the experimental flight data of the UETT airship. The extensive simulation results favour the dynamic analysis of the airship. Full article
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop