Abstract: This talk is aimed at presenting an overview of hierarchical control schemes composed by a high level Model Predictive Control (MPC) and a low level Sliding Mode Control (SMC) recently published. The SMC low level is realized by using the so-called Integral Sliding Mode (ISM) control approach and is meant to reject the matched disturbances affecting the plant, thus providing a system with reduced uncertainty for the MPC design. Both continuous and discrete-time solutions will be illustrated during the talk. Moreover, a networked version of the control approach will be discussed. It is realized as a model-based event-triggered MPC/ISM control scheme aimed at minimizing the packet transmission, thus reducing the issues related to network congestion. Finally, some applications will be briefly described.

Speaker Bio: Antonella Ferrara (S’86-M’88-SM’03-FM’20) received the M.Sc. degree in electronic engineering and the Ph.D. degree in computer science and electronics from the University of Genoa, Italy, in 1987 and 1992, respectively. Since 2005, she has been Full Professor of automatic control at the University of Pavia, Italy. Her main research interests include sliding mode control and nonlinear control applied to automotive systems, power networks, and robotics, as well as road traffic control. She is author and co-author of more than 400 publications including more than 140 journal papers, 2 monographs and one edited book. At present, she is Associate Editor of Automatica and of the International Journal of Robust and Nonlinear Control, as well as Senior Editor of IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Vehicles. She was Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control and IEEE Control Systems Magazine. She was Visiting Professor at Graz University of Technology, and Invited Lecturer at Harvard University, University of Minnesota, University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), University of Stuttgart, Technical University of Delft, INRIA Grenoble, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), Jeddah, Hanyang University, Seoul, and Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and other institutions. She was Principal Investigator in several international, European and National Projects. Dr. Ferrara is the EUCA Conference Editorial Board Chair. She is a member of the IEEE TC on Automotive Control, IEEE TC on Smart Cities, IEEE TC on Variable Structure Systems, IFAC TC on Nonlinear Control Systems, IFAC TC on Transportation Systems, and IFAC TC on Intelligent Autonomous Vehicles. She is a Fellow of IEEE.