The Stability of LTI Systems

Babar Ahmad

April 15, 2022

Introduction
It should be clear from the preceding discussions that, for an LTI system to be asymp-
totically stable, the poles of the system transfer function must lie in the left half of the
s-plane. Accordingly, an LTI system is said to be asymptotically stable if all the roots
of the denominator polynomial of the transfer function have negative real parts. If
the poles lie on the imaginary ( j ω) axis of the s-plane, the system is unstable, or at
best, marginally stable. If the system has non-repeated j ω axis poles, then it is said to
be marginally stable. We saw earlier that a pair of complex j ω axis poles produce an
oscillating response of constant amplitude to a unit-impulse input. If the system has
repeated poles on the j ω axis, then the system is unstable, as its impulse response
is of the form At e ± j ωt with the amplitude increasing as time evolves. In this section,
we shall try to determine the conditions necessary for a system to be bounded input
bounded output stable.

BIBO Stability
A system is said to possess bounded input bounded output stability (zero-state sta-
bility) if every bound input produces an output that is bound. In order to test
whether a system is BIBO stable or not, the system response, obtained using the
convolution integral is examined. If the input to the system is r (t ), and all the initial
conditions are zero, then the output, given by the convolution integral, is
Z ∞
c(t ) = r (τ)h(t − τ)d τ (1)
0
where h(t ) is the impulse response of the system.
We may also write (using the properties of the convolution integral)
Z ∞
c(t ) = h(τ)r (t − τ)d τ (2)
0

Taking the absolute value of the both sides of the above equation, we have
¯Z ∞ ¯
h(τ)r (t − τ)d τ¯¯
¯ ¯
|c(t )| = ¯
¯
0

Now the absolute value of the integral is always less than or equal to the integral
of the absolute value of the integrand. Therefore

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Z ∞
|c(t )| ≤ |h(τ)r (t − τ)|d τ
0
or Z ∞
|c(t )| ≤ |h(τ)||r (t − τ)|d τ
0
If r (t ) is bound, then there is a constant M (a finite positive number) such that

|r | ≤ M < ∞

Therefore Z ∞
|c(t )| ≤ M |h(τ)|d τ
0
If c(t ) is to be bounded, then
|c| ≤ N < ∞
where N is a finite positive number, and the following inequality must hold
Z ∞
M |h(τ)|d τ ≤ N < ∞
0

From the above condition, it is clear that the output will be bound if
Z ∞
|h(τ)|d τ
0

is bound. This implies that the area under the |h(τ)| versus τ curve must be finite
(the area under the absolute-value curve of the impulse response, evaluated from
zero to infinity, must be finite). In other words, the impulse response h(t ) must be
absolutely integrable. Hence we conclude that the system with impulse response
h(t ) is BIBO-stable, if and only if, the integral
Z ∞
|h(τ)|d τ < ∞
0
The above condition will hold, if and only if, the impulse response of the system
decays to zero as time approaches infinity. As we saw earlier, this is precisely the
requirement for a system to be asymptotically stable. Thus the condition for stability
(asymptotic as well as BIBO) of a linear time-invariant system is that all the roots of
the denominator polynomial of the transfer function must lie in the left half (LHP) of
the s-plane.
At this stage it is important to realize that stability is, perhaps, the most important
feedback control system requirement and is consequently the most widely studied
problem in linear control systems. It is obvious that if a system is unstable, then a
satisfactory transient response and steady-state error carry no meaning. An unstable
control system cannot be designed for a specific transient response or steady-state
error requirement.
To summarize, the concept of stability of closed-loop feedback systems is cen-
tral to control system design. A stable system should exhibit a bounded output if the
corresponding input is bounded. The stability of a feedback system is directly re-
lated to the location of the roots of the characteristic equation of the system transfer
function (and to the location of the eigenvalues of the system matrix for a system in
state variable form). If the closed-loop system poles are in the left half of the s-plane

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and hence have a negative real part, the system is stable. That is, stable systems have
closed-loop transfer functions with poles only in the left half-plane. Poles in the right
half s-plane yield either exponentially increasing responses or exponentially increas-
ing sinusoidal natural responses. These natural responses approach infinity as time
approaches infinity. Thus, if the closed-loop system poles are in the right half of the
s-plane and hence have a positive real parts, the system is unstable. Thus a control
system is stable if and only if all closed-loop poles lie in the left-half s-plane.

Routh-Hurwitz Criterion

[In this section, I shall provide a very brief introduction to

Routh-Hurwitz criterion. The method is easy to understand and apply.
You may study this portion on your own, from the books by OGATA or
NORMAN NISE. Kindly study this topic carefully and diligently.]

We conclude this discussion with a very brief introduction to the Routh-Hurwitz

method. The method is a very useful tool for determining the system stability, al-
lowing us to compute the number of roots of the characteristic equation (poles of
the closed-loop system) in the right half plane, without actually computing the roots
of the polynomial. The method is an algebraic technique that is very easy to apply,
and provides a design tool for determining values of system parameters necessary
for system stability. The method provides stability information without the need to
solve for the closed-loop system poles. Using this method, we can tell how many
closed-loop system poles are in the left half-plane, in the right half-plane, and on the
j ω-axis. We can find the number of poles in each section of the s-plane, but we can-
not find their coordinates. Essentially the method enables the determination of the
number of closed-loop poles that lie in the right-half of the s-plane, without carry-
ing out the factorization of the denominator polynomial. Routh’s stability criterion
tells us whether or not there are unstable roots in a polynomial equation without
actually solving for them. This stability criterion applies to polynomials with only
a finite number of terms. When the criterion is applied to a control system, infor-
mation about absolute stability can be obtained directly from the coefficients of the
characteristic equation. The method reveals how many closed-loop system poles
are in the LHP, the RHP, and on the j ω-axis. The actual power of the method lies in
design rather than analysis. For example, if there is an unknown parameter in the
denominator of a transfer function, it is difficult to determine the entire range of this
parameter to yield stability. One would probably rely on trial and error to evaluate
the stability of the system. In this situation, the Routh-Hurwitz criterion yields a
closed-form expression for the range of the unknown parameter.
The procedure in Routh-Hurwitz criterion is as follows:

• The transfer functions of the closed-loop system is given by

C (s) b 0 s m + b 1 s m−1 + · · · + b m−1 s + b m

=
R(s) a 0 s n + a 1 s n−1 + · · · + a n−1 s + a n
where the a 0 s and b 0 s are constants and m ≤ n. The characteristic equation
(the denominator polynomial) of the system is then written as

a 0 s n + a 1 s n−1 + · · · + a n−1 s + a n = 0

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where all the coefficients are real numbers. Additionally, a n 6= 0, which implies
that any zero root is removed prior to subsequent analysis. The roots of this
equation are the poles of the closed-loop system transfer function. If any of
the coefficients of this equation are zero or negative, in the presence of at least
one positive coefficient, a root or roots exist that are on the imaginary axis, or
that have positive real parts. The system is thus unstable. If we are interested
in only the absolute stability, there is no need to follow the procedure further.
Furthermore, the condition that all the coefficients of the characteristic poly-
nomial be non-zero and positive (or of the same sign) is necessary but not
sufficient to guarantee stability.

• In order to determine the general location of the system poles, the next step
involves the formation of an array, known as the Routh’s array. This array is
then examined to determine the number of closed-loop poles lying in the left
half-plane, the right half-plane, and on the j ω-axis. There are some special
cases that one encounters during the formation of the Routh’s array. You need
to consider each case carefully. The main limitation of this technique is that it
does not suggest how to improve the stability or how to stabilize an unstable
system. It does, however, enable us to determine the stability range in terms
of a system parameter (the gain K).( For example, the process may yield the
stability range for K as a < K < b, where a and b are numbers.)

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