Tracking Control Under Round-Robin Scheduling: Handling Impulsive Transmission Outliers.

In this article, the tracking control problem is investigated for a type of linear networked systems subject to the round-Robin (RR) protocol scheduling and impulsive transmission outliers (ITOs). The communication between the controller and sensors is implemented through a shared network, on which the signal transmissions are scheduled by the RR protocol. The considered ITOs are modeled by a sequence of impulsive signals whose amplitudes (i.e., the norms of all impulsive signals) and interval lengths (i.e., the duration between all adjacent impulsive signals) are greater than two known thresholds, respectively. The occurrence moment for each ITO is first examined by using a certain outlier detection approach, and then a novel parameter-dependent tracking controller is proposed to protect the tracking performance from ITOs by removing the "harmful" signals (i.e., the transmitted signals contaminated by ITOs). Sufficient conditions are presented to ensure the exponentially ultimate boundedness of the resulted tracking error, and the controller gain matrices are subsequently designed by solving a constrained optimization problem. Finally, a simulation example is provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of our developed outlier-resistant tracking control scheme.

Distributed Set-Membership Fusion Filtering for Nonlinear 2-D Systems Over Sensor Networks: An Encoding-Decoding Scheme.

In this article, the distributed set-membership fusion filtering problem is investigated for a class of nonlinear 2-D shift-varying systems subject to unknown-but-bounded noises over sensor networks. The sensors are communicated with their neighbors according to a given topology through wireless networks of limited bandwidth. With the purpose of relieving the communication burden as well as enhancing the transmission security, a logarithmic-type encoding-decoding mechanism is introduced for each sensor node so as to encode the transmitted data with a finite number of bits. A distributed set-membership filter is designed to determine the local ellipsoidal set that contains the system state by only utilizing the data from the local sensor node and its neighbors, where the proposed filter scheme is truly distributed with desirable scalability. Then, a new ellipsoid-based fusion rule is developed for the designed set-membership filters in order to form the fused ellipsoidal set that has a globally smaller volume than all local ellipsoidal sets. With the aid of the mathematical induction technique, the set theory, and the convex optimization approach, sufficient conditions are derived for the existence of the desired distributed set-membership filters and the fusion weights. Then, the filter parameters and the fusion weights are acquired by solving a set of constrained optimization problems. Finally, an illustrative example is given to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed fusion filtering algorithm.

Event-Triggered Cardinality-Constrained Cooling and Electrical Load Dispatch Based on Collaborative Neurodynamic Optimization.

This article addresses event-triggered optimal load dispatching based on collaborative neurodynamic optimization. Two cardinality-constrained global optimization problems are formulated and two event-triggering functions are defined for event-triggered load dispatching in thermal energy and electric power systems. An event-triggered dispatching method is developed in the collaborative neurodynamic optimization framework with multiple projection neural networks and a meta-heuristic updating rule. Experimental results are elaborated to demonstrate the efficacy and superiority of the approach against many existing methods for optimal load dispatching in air conditioning systems and electric power generation systems.

A Collaborative Neurodynamic Optimization Approach to Distributed Chiller Loading.

In this article, we present a collaborative neurodynamic optimization approach to distributed chiller loading in the presence of nonconvex power consumption functions and binary variables associated with cardinality constraints. We formulate a cardinality-constrained distributed optimization problem with nonconvex objective functions and discrete feasible regions, based on an augmented Lagrangian function. To overcome the difficulty caused by the nonconvexity in the formulated distributed optimization problem, we develop a collaborative neurodynamic optimization method based on multiple coupled recurrent neural networks reinitialized repeatedly using a meta-heuristic rule. We elaborate on experimental results based on two multi-chiller systems with the parameters from the chiller manufacturers to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed approach in comparison to several baselines.

Delay-Variation-Dependent Criteria on Extended Dissipativity for Discrete-Time Neural Networks With Time-Varying Delay.

This article is concerned with the extended dissipativity of discrete-time neural networks (NNs) with time-varying delay. First, the necessary and sufficient condition on matrix-valued polynomial inequalities reported recently is extended to a general case, where the variable of the polynomial does not need to start from zero. Second, a novel Lyapunov functional with a delay-dependent Lyapunov matrix is constructed by taking into consideration more information on nonlinear activation functions. By employing the Lyapunov functional method, a novel delay and its variation-dependent criterion are obtained to investigate the effects of the time-varying delay and its variation rate on several performances, such as H∞ performance, passivity, and l2-l∞ performance, of a delayed discrete-time NN in a unified framework. Finally, a numerical example is given to show that the proposed criterion outperforms some existing ones.

Distributed State Estimation Over Wireless Sensor Networks With Energy Harvesting Sensors.

This article is concerned with the distributed state estimation problem over wireless sensor networks (WSNs), where each smart sensor is capable of harvesting energy from the external environment with a certain probability. The data transmission between neighboring nodes is dependent on the energy level of each sensor, and the internode communication is deemed as a failure when the current energy level is inadequate to guarantee the normal data transmission. Considering the intermittent information exchange over WSNs, a novel distributed state estimator is first constructed via introducing a set of indicator functions, and then the evolution of the probability distribution of energy level and its steady-state distribution is systematically discussed by resorting to the eigenvalue analysis approach and the mathematical induction. Furthermore, the optimal estimator gain is derived by minimizing the trace of the estimation error covariance under known communication sequences. In addition, the convergence of the minimized upper bound of the expected estimation error covariance is analyzed under any initial condition. Finally, an illustrative example regarding the target tracking problem is provided to verify the validity of the obtained theoretical results.

Maximum Correntropy Filtering for Complex Networks With Uncertain Dynamical Bias: Enabling Componentwise Event-Triggered Transmission.

This article is concerned with the maximum correntropy filtering (MCF) problem for a class of nonlinear complex networks subject to non-Gaussian noises and uncertain dynamical bias. With aim to utilize the constrained network bandwidth and energy resources in an efficient way, a componentwise dynamic event-triggered transmission (DETT) protocol is adopted to ensure that each sensor component independently determines the time instant for transmitting data according to the individual triggering condition. The principal purpose of the addressed problem is to put forward a dynamic event-triggered recursive filtering scheme under the maximum correntropy criterion, such that the effects of the non-Gaussian noises can be attenuated. In doing so, a novel correntropy-based performance index (CBPI) is first proposed to reflect the impacts from the componentwise DETT mechanism, the system nonlinearity, and the uncertain dynamical bias. The CBPI is parameterized by deriving upper bounds on the one-step prediction error covariance and the equivalent noise covariance. Subsequently, the filter gain matrix is designed by means of maximizing the proposed CBPI. Finally, an illustrative example is provided to substantiate the feasibility and effectiveness of the developed MCF scheme.

Recursive Filtering Under Probabilistic Encoding-Decoding Schemes: Handling Randomly Occurring Measurement Outliers.

This article focuses on the recursive filtering problem for networked time-varying systems with randomly occurring measurement outliers (ROMOs), where the so-called ROMOs denote a set of large-amplitude perturbations on measurements. A new model is presented to describe the dynamical behaviors of ROMOs by using a set of independent and identically distributed stochastic scalars. A probabilistic encoding-decoding scheme is exploited to convert the measurement signal into the digital format. For the purpose of preserving the filtering process from the performance degradation induced by measurement outliers, a novel recursive filtering algorithm is developed by using the active detection-based method where the "problematic" measurements (i.e., the measurements contaminated by outliers) are removed from the filtering process. A recursive calculation approach is proposed to derive the time-varying filter parameter via minimizing such the upper bound on the filtering error covariance. The uniform boundedness of the resultant time-varying upper bound is analyzed for the filtering error covariance by using the stochastic analysis technique. Two numerical examples are presented to verify the effectiveness and correctness of our developed filter design approach.

Cyber Code Intelligence for Android Malware Detection.

Evolving Android malware poses a severe security threat to mobile users, and machine-learning (ML)-based defense techniques attract active research. Due to the lack of knowledge, many zero-day families' malware may remain undetected until the classifier gains specialized knowledge. The most existing ML-based methods will take a long time to learn new malware families in the latest malware family landscape. Existing ML-based Android malware detection and classification methods struggle with the fast evolution of the malware landscape, particularly in terms of the emergence of zero-day malware families and limited representation of single-view features. In this article, a new multiview feature intelligence (MFI) framework is developed to learn the representation of a targeted capability from known malware families for recognizing unknown and evolving malware with the same capability. The new framework performs reverse engineering to extract multiview heterogeneous features, including semantic string features, API call graph features, and smali opcode sequential features. It can learn the representation of a targeted capability from known malware families through a series of processes of feature analysis, selection, aggregation, and encoding, to detect unknown Android malware with shared target capability. We create a new dataset with ground-truth information regarding capability. Many experiments are conducted on the new dataset to evaluate the performance and effectiveness of the new method. The results demonstrate that the new method outperforms three state-of-the-art methods, including: 1) Drebin; 2) MaMaDroid; and 3) N -opcode, when detecting unknown Android malware with targeted capabilities.

Recoil attenuation for deepwater drilling riser systems via delayed H∞ control.

This paper deals with the recoil suppression problem of a deepwater drilling riser system via active H∞ control using both current and delayed states. First, based on the three degrees of freedom spring-mass-damping model of the riser system, an incremental dynamic equation of the system subject to the platform heave motion and the friction force induced by drilling discharge mud and seawater is established. Then, to reject recoil movements of the riser, a delayed state feedback H∞ controller with delayed states as well as current states is designed. The existence conditions and the design method of the delayed H∞ recoil controllers are presented. Third, the effects of the introduced time-delays on the recoil control of the riser are analyzed, and the design of optimal artificial time-delays is formulated as the minimum value problem of a series of quintic algebraic polynomials, which are related to the weights of average response amplitudes, steady-state errors, and the control force. Lastly, simulation results are provided to demonstrate the effectiveness of delay-free and delayed H∞ recoil control schemes for the riser. It is shown that (i) under the delayed H∞ controllers, the recoil responses of the riser can be controlled significantly; (ii) the decay rate of the recoil response under the delay-free H∞ controller is slightly faster than the one under the delayed H∞ controllers. However, the former requires more control cost than the latter; (iii) compared with the delayed H∞ controller with the existing linear quadratic optimal controller, the control cost by the former is larger than that by the latter. However, the steady-state errors of the riser under the latter are slightly smaller than that under the former; (iv) the introduced time-delays with proper size play positive role of suppressing recoil response of the system, and the corresponding delayed H∞ controller series provide more options for recoil control of the riser.

Influence Maximization in Multiagent Systems by a Graph Embedding Method: Dealing With Probabilistically Unstable Links.

This article is concerned with the influence maximization (IM) problem under a network with probabilistically unstable links (PULs) via graph embedding for multiagent systems (MASs). First, two diffusion models, the unstable-link independent cascade (UIC) model and the unstable-link linear threshold (ULT) model, are designed for the IM problem under the network with PULs. Second, the MAS model for the IM problem with PULs is established and a series of interaction rules among agents are built for the MAS model. Third, the similarity of the unstable structure of the nodes is defined and a novel graph embedding method, termed the unstable-similarity2vec (US2vec) approach, is proposed to tackle the IM problem under the network with PULs. According to the embedding results of the US2vec approach, the seed set is figured out by the developed algorithm. Finally, extensive experiments are conducted to: 1) verify the validity of the proposed model and the developed algorithms and 2) illustrate the optimal solution for IM under different scenarios with PULs.

Finite-Time Consensus Tracking for Incommensurate Fractional-Order Nonlinear Multiagent Systems With Directed Switching Topologies.

This article investigates the problem of finite-time consensus tracking for incommensurate fractional-order nonlinear multiagent systems (MASs) with general directed switching topology. For the leader with bounded but arbitrary dynamics, a neighborhood-based saturated observer is first designed to guarantee that the observer's state converges to the leader's state in finite time. By utilizing a fuzzy-logic system to approximate the heterogeneous and unmodeled nonlinear dynamics, an observer-based adaptive parameter control protocol is designed to solve the problem of finite-time consensus tracking of incommensurate fractional-order nonlinear MASs on directed switching topology with a restricted dwell time. Then, the derived result is further extended to the case of directed switching topology without a restricted dwell time by designing an observer-based adaptive gain control protocol. By artfully choosing a piecewise Lyapunov function, it is shown that the consensus tracking error converges to a small adjustable residual set in finite time for both the cases with and without a restricted dwell time. It should be noted that the proposed adaptive gain consensus tracking protocol is completely distributed in the sense that there is no need for any global information. The effectiveness of the proposed consensus tracking scheme is illustrated by numerical simulations.

Sampled-Data Consensus of Linear Time-Varying Multiagent Networks With Time-Varying Topologies.

The main purpose of this article is to investigate the consensus of linear multiagent networks with time-varying characteristics under sampled-data communications, where the time-varying characteristics include both time-varying topologies and the node's linear time-varying dynamics. By using the decoupling method, we prove that the sampled-data consensus problem of multiagent networks is equal to the stability problem of sampled-data systems. Then, the globally asymptotical consensus is investigated for multiagent networks with time-varying characteristics by virtue of the Lyapunov function method. It should be noted that when the Lyapunov function method is utilized to investigate the stability problem of control systems, it is always assumed that the derivative of the constructed Lyapunov function is not more than zero. This assumption is removed here and as a replacement, the average value of the derivative of the Lyapunov function in a period to be negative is needed.

Distributed Quasiconsensus Control for Stochastic Multiagent Systems Under Round-Robin Protocol and Uniform Quantization.

In this article, the problem of consensus control is investigated for a class of multiagent systems (MASs) with both stochastic noises and nonidentical exogenous disturbances. The signal transmission among agents is implemented through a digital communication network subject to both uniform quantization and round-robin protocol as a reflection of network constraints. The consensus strategy is designed by adopting the estimates of the relative states of the agent to its neighbors, which renders the distributed nature of the controller. A new consensus concept, namely, quasiconsensus in probability, is employed to evaluate the state response of the agents to the stochastic noises, the exogenous disturbances, and the quantization error. An augmented system is first formed that relies on the deviations of the individual state from the average state, the observer error of the relative state, as well as the relative measurement output. Based on the augmented model, an analysis approach on dynamical behaviors is developed to facilitate the consensus analysis of MASs by means of the switching Lyapunov function technique and the stochastic analysis methods. Then, the existence condition and the explicit expression of the time-varying gain matrices are proposed for the expected controller by resorting to the feasibility of several matrix inequalities. Numerical simulation results are presented to demonstrate the applicability of the theoretical results.

On Consensus of Second-Order Multiagent Systems With Actuator Saturations: A Generalized-Nyquist-Criterion-Based Approach.

In this article, a frequency-domain approach is developed to deal with the global consensus problem for a class of general second-order multiagent systems (MASs) subject to actuator saturations. By employing the describing function and the generalized Nyquist criterion, the global consensus problem is thoroughly investigated for both undirected and directed topologies. First, the describing function is introduced to characterize the actuator saturations in the s -plane, and the inherent representation error is quantitatively analyzed from a frequency-domain perspective. Then, by means of the Kronecker product, the addressed consensus problem of the MAS is transformed into a corresponding stability analysis problem for a certain multi-input-multi-output (MIMO) system and, consequently, the generalized Nyquist criterion for MIMO systems is exploited to derive the condition for the global consensus of the MAS where the impact from the actuator saturation is explicitly reflected. Finally, numerical simulations are provided to illustrate the validity of the proposed theoretical result.

Recursive State Estimation for Networked Multirate Multisensor Systems With Distributed Time-Delays Under Round-Robin Protocol.

This article is concerned with the problem of recursive state estimation for a class of multirate multisensor systems with distributed time delays under the round-robin (R-R) protocol. The state updating period of the system and the sampling period of the sensors are allowed to be different so as to reflect the engineering practice. An iterative method is presented to transform the multirate system into a single-rate one, thereby facilitating the system analysis. The R-R protocol is introduced to determine the transmission sequence of sensors with the aim to alleviate undesirable data collisions. Under the R-R protocol scheduling, only one sensor can get access to transmit its measurement at each sampling time instant. The main purpose of this article is to develop a recursive state estimation scheme such that an upper bound on the estimation error covariance is guaranteed and then locally minimized through adequately designing the estimator parameter. Finally, simulation examples are provided to show the effectiveness of the proposed estimator design scheme.

Distributed Maximum Correntropy Filtering for Stochastic Nonlinear Systems Under Deception Attacks.

This article focuses on the distributed maximum correntropy filtering issue for general stochastic nonlinear systems subject to deception attacks. The considered nonlinear functions consist of a determined one and a stochastic one, and the stochastic signals sent by deception attacks with identified statistic characteristics could be non-Gaussian. The corresponding calculation formulas of both the filter gains and the upper bound of the filter error covariance are proposed by means of the Taylor series expansion and the fixed-point iterative update rule, where the weighted maximum correntropy criterion is utilized to take the place of traditional minimum covariance indexes. Such an upper bound is only dependent on the local information, neighbor information, and the identified statistics of deception attacks and, therefore, the developed filtering scheme realizes the requirement of distributed calculation. Furthermore, a simplified version is obtained by removing weights in the correntropy criterion. Finally, an illustrative example is given to verify the effectiveness of developed distributed maximum correntropy filtering subject to deception attacks.

Decision and Event-Based Fixed-Time Consensus Control for Electromagnetic Source Localization.

This article deals with the problem of electromagnetic source localization (ESL). An evolutionary particle filter, which is first used to make a decision on the positions of electromagnetic sources, has two characteristics. One characteristic is that the number of particles can be significantly reduced while the other characteristic is that the particle diversity can be well improved. On the basis of the estimated positions of electromagnetic sources, the position and velocity of the virtual leader can be determined. Then, an event-based fixed-time consensus control approach is proposed such that the positions and velocities of robots reach consensus with the virtual leader over a fixed-time interval while saving resource consumption by reducing the communication frequencies and updating times of control inputs. Finally, simulation and experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed decision and event-based fixed-time consensus control approach for ESL.

Event-Triggered Dynamic Positioning for Mass-Switched Unmanned Marine Vehicles in Network Environments.

This article is concerned with event-triggered dynamic positioning for a mass-switched unmanned marine vehicle (UMV) in network environments. First, a switched dynamic positioning system (DPS) model for a mass-switched marine vehicle is established. The switched DPS model takes into consideration changes in the marine vehicle's mass and the resultant switching of the marine vehicle's parameters. Second, for a mass-switched UMV controlled through a communication network, a novel weighted event-triggering communication scheme considering switching features is proposed. The weighted error data of multiple sampling instants are utilized to avoid a long-time nontriggering phenomenon. The consideration of switching features guarantees the current sampled data to be transmitted if a switch occurs between the last sampling instant and the current sampling instant. Then, under the event-triggering scheme, an asynchronously switched DPS model for the mass-switched UMV is established in network environments. Based on this model, a mode-dependent DPS controller and event generator co-design method are proposed to attenuate the disturbance induced by wind, waves, and ocean currents. The DPS performance analysis demonstrates the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Received Signal Strength Indicator-Based Indoor Localization Using Distributed Set-Membership Filtering.

Most of the existing localization schemes necessitate a priori statistical characteristic of measurement noise, which may be unrealistic in practical applications. This article addresses the problem of indoor localization by implementing distributed set-membership filtering based on a received signal strength indicator (RSSI) under unknown-but-bounded process and measurement noises. First, the transmit power and the path-loss exponent are estimated by a novel least-squares curve fitting (LSCF) method in RSSI-based localization. Since the localization process of trilateration is susceptible to inaccuracy caused by the noise-affected distance measurements, a convex optimization method is then developed to obtain the state ellipsoid estimation under the unknown-but-bounded noises. Third, a recursive algorithm is established to compute the global ellipsoid that guarantees to locate the true target at every time step. Finally, experimental validation is presented to demonstrate the accuracy and effectiveness of the proposed set-membership filtering method for indoor localization.