International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems 17(4) (2019) 936-947 ISSN:1598-6446 eISSN:2005-4092

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12555-018-0129-3 http://www.springer.com/12555

Fractional Order IMC Controller Design for Two-input-two-output Frac-

tional Order System
Dazi Li* O , Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin

Abstract: Research on the fractional order system is becoming more and more popular. Most of the fractional order
controller design methods focus on single-input-single-output processes. In this paper, a fractional order internal
model controller with inverted decoupling is proposed to handle non-integer order two-input-two-output systems
with time delay. The fractional order two-input-two-output (FO-TITO) process is decoupled by inverted decoupling
method. The fractional order internal model control (IMC) is then used to simplify the tuning process. Because of
the complexity of multiple time delay, the condition of FO-TITO process with time delay is discussed. In order to
ensure the robustness of the system, a Maximum sensitivity function is used to tune the parameters. Then Lyapunov
stability theory is applied to verify the stability of the system. The proposed controller provides ideal performance
for both set point-tracking and disturbance rejection and is robust to process gain variations. Numerical results
show the performance of the proposed method.

Keywords: Fractional order system, internal model control, inverted decoupling, Lyapunov stability theory,
maximum sensitivity function, time delay, two-input-two-output process.

1. INTRODUCTION Fractional order modeling and control have been proved

The proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller
proposed in 1920s has been the most popular controller
in industry. For such a long time, many other control
methods have been proposed, but in the industrial fields,
PID is still the most popular process control technique.
This is because most of the systems are modeled as inte-
ger order system. At the same time, the PID controller
provides robust performance for both single-input-single-
output (SISO) systems and multiple-input-multiple-output
(MIMO) system which are modeled as integer order.
However, for some cases, the system can be and should
be modeled as non-integer order system, and the system
modeled as integer order is just an approximate method.
But, when the system is modeled as non-integer order, can
the integer order PID method still provide an ideal perfor-
mance? There are a lot of researches focus on the com-
parison of the performance between fractional order and
integer order. These literatures give the same conclusion
that the fractional order controller for the fractional order
process provides even better performance for robustness,
set point-tracking and disturbance rejection than integer
order.
capable of providing “better than best” performance than
integer order one under fair comparisons [1, 2]. Many re-
search has made it more and more convincing that frac-
tional models can describe the physical phenomenon more
accurately. For the fractional order processes, of course,
the fractional order controller performs better. Fractional
calculus has been combined with integer order controller
method. Fractional calculus is applied to active distur-
bance rejection control (ADRC) [3] to improve the per-
formance commensurate to linear fractional order sys-
tems. The internal model control (IMC) is combined with
the fractional order (FOIMC) to design the controller and
to achieve the tuning parameters. The simple structure
makes the FOIMC method easy to be implemented. Frac-
tional order proportional-integral-derivative (FOPID) was
proposed by Oustaloup [4]. FOPID method has five pa-
rameters to tune which means it has more flexibility in
controller design. Research on FOPID has shown that it
provides a better dynamic performance and a better ro-
bustness than the integer order PID controller for frac-
tional order systems [5]. Researchs on FOPID is mainly
focused on tuning method. Literatures [6–15] demonstrate
many methods for the tuning of FOPID.

Manuscript received March 5, 2018; revised September 21, 2018; accepted November 12, 2018. Recommended by Associate Editor Niket
Kaisare under the direction of Editor Young IL Lee. This research has been supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of
China (61873022, 61573052), in part by the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (4182045) and in part by the Fundamental Research Funds
for the Central Universities under Grant XK1802-4.

Dazi Li, Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin are with the Department of Automation, College of Information Science and Tech-
nology, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing, 100029, China (e-mails: lidz@mail.buct.edu.cn, hexingyu1991@foxmail.com,
skyer_00@163.com, jinqb@mail.buct.edu.cn).
* Corresponding author.

⃝ICROS,
c KIEE and Springer 2019
 Fractional Order IMC Controller Design for Two-input-two-output Fractional Order System 937

From these works mentioned above, it can be seen that

most fractional order control methods focus on SISO pro-
cesses. When it comes to fractional order multiple-input-
multiple-output (MIMO) process, few works have been
down. In [16], a multivariable fractional order PID con-
troller was proposed for FO-MIMO process. But it has a
lot of parameters to tune, which leads to a complex tun-
ing method. In this paper, based on research for FO-TITO
processes with time delay systems [17], we extend FO-
IMC control to FO-TITO process. In order to eliminate or Fig. 1. FOIMC standard structure.
minimize the interaction between the two primary loops,
inverted decoupling is applied. A tuning strategy based
on maximum sensitivity function is introduced to ensure
the robustness of the system. Lyapunov stability theory is
applied to verify the system stability.
The rest section of this paper is structured as follows: In
Section 2, we introduce the fractional order process with
time delay, the fractional order IMC method and the struc-
ture of the fractional order two-input-two-output process Fig. 2. FOIMC standard structure.
with time delay. The structure of the inverted decoupling,
the maximum sensitivity based tuning method and the de-
tional derivative, Dλi represents the differentiation opera-
sign of the proposed controller are given in Section 3. Sev-
tor where the differentiation order is λi .
eral numerical examples and comparisons of the perfor-
In order to get the transfer function of the system de-
mance between the proposed method and other methods
scribed in (2), Laplace transformation is used in (2). And
are introduced in Section 4. Concluding remarks are given
the SISO fractional system can be described as
in Section 5.
ωi
Y (s) b0 + ∑m
i=1 bi s
G(s) = = . (3)
2. FRACTIONAL ORDER PROCESS U(s) a0 + ∑i=1 ai sλi
n

2.1. Fractional order process

To some extent, integer order calculus is a special case
of fractional calculus. As a branch of mathematic, frac-
tional calculus has developed for a long time. As a result,
numbers of different definitions of fractional calculus have
been presented based on different situations. In this paper,
the fractional order integral definition which was proposed
by Riemann and Liouville [18] is used. It is defined as:
∫ t
−ν 1 and the corresponding model, CFOIMC (s) is the FOIMC
a Dt f (t) = (t − τ )ν −1 f (τ )d τ ,
Γ(γ ) a controller.
where f (t) is an arbitrary integrable function, Γ(γ ) rep-
resents the Gamma function, ν denotes the fractional in-
tegral order related to time t and t is the upper limit and
a is the lower limit. With a positive ν , the fractional cal-
culus operator a Dt−ν denotes fractional derivative, and a
negative ν represents fractional integral.
Consider a SISO linear time invariant order system de-
scribed as:
n m
a0 y(t) + ∑ ai Dλi (y(t)) = b0 u(t) + ∑ bi Dωi (u(t)),
i=1 i=1
where y(t) is the input, u(t) is the output, a, bi ∈ R are
coefficient parameters, λi , ωi ∈ R+ are the orders of frac-
2.2. Fractional order based SISO-IMC method
Internal model control method was developed by
Morari and co-workers [19,20]. It is a model-based design
method for integral systems. When it comes to fractional
order process [21], obviously, fractional order method
should be applied to IMC method [22]. The fractional
order internal model control (FOIMC) based control sys-
tem is shown in Fig. 1. GP (s) and Gm (s) denote the plant
(1)
An equivalent conventional feedback control structure
is shown in Fig. 2. Controller C(s) and CFOIMC (s) have
the relationship described as
CFOIMC (s)
C(s) = . (4)
1 −CFOIMC (s)Gm (s)
To obtain the FOIMC controller, two steps are needed
[23, 24]:
Step 1: The model of plant can be factored as
−
Gm (s) = G+
m (s)Gm (s), (5)
(2)
where G+ m (s) contains time delay in right half zeros. In
fact, G+m (s)is the unstable part of the transfer function
Gm (s). It is worth noting that in fractional order system,
938 Dazi Li, Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin

the zero of Gm (s) doesn’t lie in the right half section re- y(t) = Cx(t), (13)
gion of the complex plane. What’s more, G+ m (s) must have
a steady-state gain equal to one. And the steady-state gain where the fractional order γ ∈ (0, 1), A is the system ma-
of Gm (s) remains in G−m (s).
trix, B is the input matrix and C is the output matrix. By
Step 2: The controller CFOIMC (s)is specified as using the Laplace transformation to (9) and (10), with zero
initial condition, the state space of the system can be ob-
1 tained as
CFOIMC (s) = f (s), (6)
G−
m (s)
Sγ X(s) = AX(s) + BU(s), (14)
where f (s) is a low pass filter with a steady gain of one.
Typically, it has the form: Y (s) = CX(s). (15)

1 Equation (13) shows the relationship between output Y (s)

f (s) = . (7)
(1 + λ s)k and input U(s):
The conventional controller C(s) has the form: Y (s) = G p (s)U(s). (16)
CFOIMC (s)
C(s) = . (8) By applying (14) and (15) in (16), the transfer function
1 −CFOIMC (s)Gm (s) matrix is acquired:
In (7), λ is the desired closed-loop time constant, and it [ ]
G p11 (s) G p12 (s)
is the only parameter need to be tuned, k is the filter order G p (s) = C(sγ I − A)−1 B = ,
G p21 (s) G p22 (s)
which is a positive integer to ensure the realizablation of
the controller. The existence of filter f (s) plays a role of (17)
tradeoff between disturbance rejection and set-point track- where eachGi j (s)is a fractional order transfer function
ing. shown as follows:
2.3. Fractional SISO-IMC controller with time delay bi j1 sβi j1 + bi j0
Gi j (s) = , i, j = 1, 2, (18)
Let us consider a fractional order system given by ai j2 s i j2 + ai j1 sαi j1 + ai j0
α

b1 sβ1 + b0 where βi j , αi j ∈ R+ (αi j , βi j ∈ (0, 1)) are the fractional

G(s) = e−θ s (α2 > α1 , α2 > β1 ),
a2 sα2
+ a1 sα1 + a0 order, ai j , bi j ∈ R+ are the coefficients, and αi j2 ≥ βi j1 ,
(9) αi j2 ≥ αi j1 . The transfer functions G12 (s) and G21 (s) de-
note the interaction between two main loops. The block
where e−θ s is the time delay item.
diagram of a TITO process is shown in Fig. 1.
After factoring the process G(s), the G−
m (s) which is the
singular part of G(s) is obtained as
3. INVERTED DECOUPLING BASED
b1 sβ1 + b0 FO-TITO-IMC CONTROLLER DESIGN
G−
m (s) = . (10)
a2 sα2 + a1 sα1 + a0
In the last section, the FO-TITO process, which is the
According to (6), the IMC controller is obtained as object to be controlled by the controller proposed in this
a2 sα2 + a1 sα1 + a0 paper, has been introduced. In order to design the FO-
CFOIMC (s) = . (11) TITO-IMC controller, two steps are needed:
(b1 sβ1 + b0 )(1 + λ s)k
Step 1: decouple the FO-TITO process.
2.4. Fractional order TITO process Step 2: design the IMC controller based on FO-TITO
process decoupled.
Fractional order IMC method is used to control single-
In this section, inverted decoupling and internal model
input-single-output (SISO) fractional order system [25,
control (IMC) are used to design the controller for the FO-
26]. However, few research achievements focus on the
TITO process.
multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) fractional order
system control. In this paper, we proposed a controller
3.1. Inverted decoupling
which is based on fractional order and multivariable in-
ternal model control method to control a TITO fractional Because of the existence of interaction between two pri-
order process. mary loops of the TITO process mentioned in Section 2,
Consider a linear TITO fractional order system de- controlling a TITO process without decoupling seems im-
scribed by the following fractional order differential equa- possible. According to [27], decoupling methods such as
tions: ideal decoupling. Simple decoupling and inverted decou-
pling can be used to eliminate the interaction between the
γ
0 Dt x(t) = Ax(t) + Bu(t), (12) loops. Ideal decoupling has the most complex decoupler
 Fractional Order IMC Controller Design for Two-input-two-output Fractional Order System 939

c2 G p22 = y2 , (22)

which means the generalized open loop transfer matrix is

[ ]
G p11 (s) 0
G(s) = . (23)
0 G p22 (s)

Substituting (17) into (19), the decoupler can be rewritten

as

d12 (s)
Fig. 3. The block diagram of the inverted decoupling. (b121 sβ121 + b120 )(a112 sα112 + a111 sα111 + a110 )
=− ,
(b111 sβ111 + b110 )(a122 sα112 + a121 sα121 + a120 )
expression. Simple decoupling method will make the gen- d21 (s)
eralized matrix complex. Different from the ideal and sim- (b211 sβ211 + b210 )(a222 sα222 + a221 sα221 + a220 )
=− ,
ple decoupling methods, inverted decoupling has a simple (b221 sβ221 + b220 )(a212 sα112 + a211 sα211 + a210 )
structure of decoupler and generalized matrix. The con- (24)
troller design method is based on IMC which is a model
based method. A simple structure of generalized matrix where βi j and αi j are fractional order, a and b are the co-
can reduce difficulty of controller design. These are why efficients of the transfer function decoupler in (18). The
inverted decoupling is chosen. Inverted decoupling has decoupler in (24) can be the form of a filter with fractional
simple structure which is easy to implement. After in- order [28]. Obviously, the decoupler may not be realized
verted decoupling, the structure of the decoupler and the in some situation. Researches on the realizablation of de-
generalized transfer matrix are very simple. The block di- coupler for integer can be found in [29,30]. The condition
agram of the inverted decoupling is shown in Fig. 3. that can guarantee the realizablation of the inverted decou-
According to the theory of decoupling, the decoupler pling will be discussed later.
can be obtained:
3.2. Inverted decoupling with time delay
G p12 (s)
d12 (s) = − , Process with no time delay was discussed in the last
G p11 (s) sections. However, most of the processes in industry do
G p21 (s) have time delay.
d21 (s) = − . (19)
G p22 (s) Considering a FO-TITO process with time delay:
[ ]
Because of the special structure of the decoupler, the G p11 (s) G p12 (s)
G p (s) = , (25)
generalized open loop transfer matrix cannot be easily ob- G p21 (s) G p22 (s)
tained by the product of the decoupling matrix and the
transfer function matrix. Based on the structure shown in where each transfer function G pi j (s) has the form of
Fig. 3, the generalized open loop transfer matrix can be
bi j1 sβi j1 + bi j0
obtained. GPi j (s) = α
e−θi j s . (26)
From Fig. (3), the output of controller c1 , c2 and the ai j2 s i j2 + ai j1 sα i j1 + ai j0
input u1 , u2 of Gm (s) have the relationship as By applying the inverted decoupling mentioned in the last
G p12 (s) section, the decoupler can be obtained as
u1 = c1 − u2 ,
G p11 (s) d12 (s)
G p21 (s) (b121 sβ121 + b120 )(a112 sα112 + a111 sα111 + a110 )
u2 = c2 − u1 . (20) =−
G p22 (s)
(b111 sβ111 + b110 )(a122 sα112 + a121 sα121 + a120 )
The input u1 , u2 of Gm (s) and the output of the system y × e−(θ12 −θ11 )s ,
has the relationship as d21 (s)
u1 G p11 (s) + u2 G p12 (s) = y1 , (b211 sβ211 + b210 )(a222 sα222 + a221 sα221 + a220 )
=−
u2 G p22 (s) + u1 G p21 (s) = y2 . (21) (b221 sβ221 + b220 )(a212 sα112 + a211 sα211 + a210 )
× e−(θ21 −θ22 )s . (27)
Substituting (20) into (21), the result will be
It is worth noting that if the time-delayed item θi j has
c1 G p11 = y1 , the relationship such as θ12 < θ11 , θ21 < θ22 , the decoupler
940 Dazi Li, Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin
is non-causal, which means the transfer function of the
decoupler is difficult to realize. As is shown, the fractional
order αi j and βi j , the time delay item θi j must satisfy some
conditions to make sure the decouple realizable.
3.3. Realizability of the decoupler
The principle of the realizability of the decoupler is to
make the elements of the decoupler proper, causal and sta-
ble. For square process with time delay, the conditions that
can guarantee the realizability of the decoupler has been
discussed [31]. There are two aspects to be considered:
- Because of the form of the decoupler mentioned in
(24), each decoupler contains a time-delay item. This
time delay item must be causal which means the nu-
merator should be smaller than that of the numerator
in (27). θik is the time delay of row i of the transfer
function G p (s). Then the conditions mentioned below
must be fulfilled:
θii ≤ θik ≤ min(θi j ).
i̸= j
- In order to make sure the decoupler element proper,
the relative degree ri j must be greater than zero which
means the order of the denominator must be bigger or
equal than that of the numerator in (27), where ri j is
the relative degree of G pi j (s), and rik is the relative de-
gree of row i of the transfer function G p (s). Relative
degree ri j must satisfy the condition following
rii ≤ ri j ≤ min(ri j ).
j̸=i
According to (28) and (29), to make the decoupler real-
izable, the diagonal element G pii should have the smallest
of time delay and relative degree in its row.
3.4. Controller design
Let us consider a FO-TITO process. Each element of
the transfer function matrix has the same form as (18). In
order to design the controller of the system, the FO-TITO
process should be decoupled. The block diagram of the
system is shown in Fig. 3. After applying inverted de-
coupling to the FO-TITO process, the interaction between
the two primary loops has been minimized, which means
the controllers C11 (s) and C22 (s) can be designed sepa-
rately. The FOIMC method discussed in Section 2 is used
to achieve the controller with the following expressions:
C11 (s) = G−1
m11− (s) f 1 (s),
C22 (s) = −1
Gm22− (s) f2 (s),
where f1 (s) and f2 (s) are the low pass filters. They have
the forms:
1 It can be seen that the lower the value of Ms is, the
f1 (s) = ,
(1 + λ1 s)k1
1
f2 (s) = , (31)
(1 + λ2 s)k2
where λ1 , λ2 are the only parameters to tune, and k1 and k2
are integer order. Actually, when the order k1 , k2 become
non-integer, this control method can still work.
Based on (30) and (31), the following FOIMC con-
troller can be acquired as
a112 sα112 + a111 sα111 + a110
C11 (s) = ,
(b111 sβ111 + b110 )(1 + λ1 s)k1
a222 sα222 + a221 sα221 + a220
C22 (s) = , (32)
(b221 sβ 221 + b220 )(1 + λ2 s)k2
where the fractional order αi j , βi j and the integer order k
must satisfy the following condition so that the controller
proposed in this paper is realizable:
β111 +k1 > α112 , β221 + k2 > α222 . (33)
(28) Usually, the fractional order αi j and βi j range from 0 to 1,
which means k = 1 satisfies (33).
3.5. Parameters tuning based on maximum sensitivity
A common sense in a controller design is that the pa-
rameters tuning is of great importance, especially when
the controller design method is model based. Because of
the changeable of the operating conditions and times, ro-
bustness against the parameter fluctuations of the system
is important in process controls. To solve this problem,
(29) maximum sensitivity (Ms ) is used to tune the parameters
in the fractional controller design. The maximum sensi-
tivity is defined as
1
Ms = max . (34)
ω ∈[0,+∞] 1 +C( jω )G p ( jω )
It is a common sense that gain margin (Am ) and phase
margin (φm ) show the robustness of the system. Fig. 4
shows the Nyquist curve of the open-loop transfer func-
tion. In (35), C( jω )G p ( jω ) is the open-loop transfer
function. The maximum sensitivity Ms means the inverse
of the shortest distance from the Nyquist curve to the crit-
ical point (−1, j0). In Fig. 4, the point A is the tangent
point. If the value of Ms is given, according to (34), we
have
1 − jθ
C ( jw) G p ( jw) = −1 + e . (35)
Ms
(30) A is the tangent point of the Nyquist curve and we have
d (C ( jw) G p ( jw)) π
arg = −θ. (36)
dw 2
more robust the system is. Assuming Gm (s) = G p (s) as
 Fractional Order IMC Controller Design for Two-input-two-output Fractional Order System 941

+ 2.8168Ms2 − 2.3714Ms + 0.8031) × 103 , (41)

λ ≈ θ (−0.0595Ms5 + 0.4995Ms4 − 1.6769Ms3
+ 2.8168Ms2 − 2.3714Ms + 0.8031) × 103 . (42)
Once the maximum sensitivity Ms is given, the parame-
ters of the controller can be determined.

3.6. Stability analysis

Stability is the basic requirement for control systems,
certainly including fractional-order systems. There are
some results on the research on the stability of the frac-
tional order system [32, 33]. Because of the particularity
of IMC method, the Lyapunov stability theory which is
usually used in integer order systems can also verify the
system stability in this paper. Although the controller and
the controlled plant are of fractional order, the close loop
transfer function of the proposed system is of integer or-
der. This owes to the IMC method. There are two primary
Fig. 4. Nyquist curve of the open-loop transfer function. loops in the structure of the FO-TITO-IMC controller pro-
posed in this paper. By applying inverted decoupling to
the FO-TITO process, the interaction between the two pri-
shown in Fig. 1 and according to (8) the following open- mary loops has been minimized and we can verify the sta-
loop transfer function of the system can be obtained as bility of the two primary loops separately. If both of the
primary loops are stable, the system is stable.
CFOIMC Gm (s)
G(s) = C(s)G p (s) = . (37) In this section, the second method of Lyapunov is used
1 −CFOIMC (s)Gm (s) to verify the stability of the system by considering a frac-
Applying (6) to (37), the open-loop transfer function can tional order system with time delay given by
be obtained as K
Gm (s) = e−θ s , (43)
e −θ s T sα + 1
G(s) = . (38)
(1 + λ s)k − e−θ s where e−θ s is the time delay which can be approximated
by a first order padé approximation
According to (38), the open-loop transfer function can be
obtained as 1 − 0.5θ s
e−θ s ≈ . (44)
1 + 0.5θ s
e−θ s e− jωθ
G(s) = = , According to (6), (7) and (8), the equivalent conventional
1 + λ s − e−θ s 1 + jωλ − e− jωθ s= jω
feedback controller C (s) is given by
(39)
(T sα + 1) (1 + 0.5θ s)
− jωθ C (s) = . (45)
where e = cos(−ωθ ) + j sin(−ωθ ). By applying K (1 + λ s) (1 + 0.5θ s) − 1 + 0.5θ s
(39) into (35) and (36), we have obtained:
 ( ) Then, the open loop transfer function will be

 cos(A) − j sin(A) 1

 Im = − sin(θ ), G (s) =C (s) Gm (s)

 1 + jAB − cos(A) + j sin(A) M

 ( )
s
(T sα + 1) (1 + 0.5θ s)
cos(A) − j sin(A) 1 =
Re = cos(θ )−1, K (1 + λ s) (1 + 0.5θ s) − 1 + 0.5θ s

 1+ jAB−cos(A)+ j sin(A) Ms

 1 − 0.5θ s

 π K

 arg(
dG(A)
) = −θ, × α ×
dA 2 T s + 1 1 + 0.5θ s
(40) 1 − 0.5θ s
=
(1 + λ s) (1 + 0.5θ s) − 1 + 0.5θ s
where A = ωθ , B = λ /θ , because (40) is a nonlinear 1 − 0.5θ s
equation, an approximated relationship of B, λ and Ms = . (46)
0.5λ θ s2 + (θ + λ ) s
can be achieved by using the Matlab fsolve function with
an initial guess (0.5, 0.5, 0.5) as According (46), because the open loop transfer function
is an integer one, the state space equation of the system
B ≈ (−0.0595Ms5 + 0.4995Ms4 − 1.6769Ms3 can be easily achieved.
942 Dazi Li, Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin

The state space equation is shown as

ẋ = Ax. (47)

According to the second method of Lyapunov, if there

exists a positive define matrix P and a semi positive defi-
nite matrix Q satisfying the following equation:

AT P + PA = −Q, (48)

then the system is stable.

4. NUMERICAL EXAMPLES

Simulations have been down to evaluate the perfor-

mance and the simplicity of parameters tuning of the pro- Fig. 5. The block of the inverted decoupling based FO-
posed inverted decoupling based FO-TITO-IMC method. TITO-IMC control.
In this part, the TITO-FOPID is used to compare with the
method proposed in this paper.
In the simulation, the fractional order operator sα is ap-
proximated with Oustaloup approximation [27, 34]. The
structure of the simulation is shown in Fig. 5.

4.1. Example 1
Considering a FO-TITO process without time delay as
mentioned in [27]:
[ 1.2 0.6
]
2s0.5 +1 3s 0.7 +1
G p (s) = 0.5 1.5 . (49)
s0.8 +1 3s0.6 +1

The TITO-FOPID is used to compare with the method

proposed in this paper. To design the FOPID controller, a
frequency domain tuning method which was proposed by
Monje et al. [7] is applied. Here, the design specification
of loop 1 are φm1 = 90◦ and ωc1 = 1.5 rad/s, and the design Fig. 6. Step response of TITO-FOPID and the proposed
specification of loop 2 are φm2 = 90◦ and ωc2 = 1.5 rad/s. method.
φm is the Phase margin, and ωc is the crossover frequency.
The inverted decoupling shown in section 3 is used here.
3s0.6 + 1
The FOPID controllers can be obtained as C22 (s) = . (51)
1.5(1 + 0.5843s)
3.307
CFOPID−1 = 0.7613 + , The closed-loop system step response of the two pri-
s0.8147
3.1723 mary loops is shown in Fig. 6 when a unit step input is
CFOPID−2 = 1.1953 + 0.7573 . (50) set for the set-points at t = 0 s and t = 4 s. Step distur-
s
bances of the magnitude 0.1 are added into the two inputs
A maximum sensitivity based parameters tuning
at t = 10 s. It can be seen from Fig. 6 that the decoupling
method based on frequency domain strategy is used. De-
performance of the FO-TITO-IMC controller is better, and
tails about this method can be found in [16]. According to
there is no overshoot with very fast step responses. The
(34), the value of Ms1 which is the maximum sensitivity
proposed method performs better than the TITO-FOPID
of loop 1 can be equal to 1, and Ms2 of loop 2 is equal to
method for the overshot of the proposed method is smaller.
1. For fair comparison, Ms1 = Ms2 = 1 is used as a design
Both of the methods have a good performance for distur-
specification in the proposed controller design method.
bance rejection.
According to (42), the values of λi can be calculated as
To test the robustness of the control system, the model
λ1 = 0.667, λ2 = 0.5843. The following FO-TITO-IMC
mismatches with a 30% parameter uncertainty is setted up.
controller can be obtained with the order k1 = k2 = 1 for
The results are shown in Fig. 7 and Fig. 8. When the case
simplicity:
of model mismatching exists, the robust performance of
2s0.5 + 1 the proposed method is obtained as well as TITO-FOPID
C11 (s) = , method.
1.2(1 + 0.667s)
 Fractional Order IMC Controller Design for Two-input-two-output Fractional Order System 943

Fig. 7. Step response of the proposed method with 30% Fig. 9. Tracking and disturbance rejection performance of
parameter perturbation. the proposed method with white noisy.

means Loop 1 is stable.

The state equation of loop 2 can be achieved as
1
ẋ = − x + u. (53)
λ2
In the same way as loop 1, A2 = −1/λ2 , a positive ma-
trix P2 = 1 is chosen. According to the second method of
Lyapunov, Q2 = 2/λ2 can satisfy (48), which means Loop
2 is stable. Then the FO-TITO system is stable.

4.2. Example 2
In this section, the process with time delay is chosen to
test the performance of the proposed method.
Consider a FO-TITO process with time delay as men-
Fig. 8. Step response of the TITO-FOPID method with tioned in [27]:
30% parameter perturbation. [ −0.2s −0.3s
]
1.2e 0.6e
G p (s) = 2s0.5 +1 3s0.7 +1 . (54)
0.5e−0.4s 1.5e−0.3s
s0.8 +1 3s0.6 +1
In Fig. 9, a Gaussian white noisy with zero mean, a vari-
ance of 0.1 and a frequency equal to 100 Hz is added to the Since θ12 > θ11 and θ21 > θ22 in this example, accord-
input signal. This figure shows that the proposed method ing to (27), the new decoupler d12 (s) and d21 (s) can be
performs well in noisy rejection. The output curve of the obtained as follows:
TITO-FOPID is much noisier than the proposed method. 2s0.5 + 1 −0.1s
As is mentioned in section 3, the second method of Lya- d12 (s) = − e ,
2(3s0.7 + 1)
punov is used to analyze the stability of the system. In (55)
3s0.6 + 1 −0.1s
Example 1, after decoupled, the stability of the two loops d21 (s) = − 0.8 e .
of the FO-TITO system can be verified separately. Both of 3(s + 1)
the two loops are stable, then conclusion that the system is As mentioned in Example 1, the controller is designed
stable can be reached. According to (50), the state space by the method as [7]. The design specification of loop 1
equation of loop 1 can be achieved as are φm1 = 54◦ and ωc1 = 1 rad/s, and the specifications of
1 loop 2 are φm2 = 70◦ and ωc2 = 1 rad/s. The TITO-FOPID
ẋ = − x + u, (52) controller obtained is
λ1
2.3
where λ is the parameter of the controller. A1 = −1/λ1 , a C11 (s) = 1.78(1 +
s0.93
),
positive matrix P1 = 1 is chosen, according to the second (56)
2.67
method of Lyapunov, Q1 = 2/λ1 can satisfy (47) which C22 (s) = 1 +
s0.78
.
944 Dazi Li, Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin

Fig. 10. Step response of the TITO-FOPID method and Fig. 11. tep response of the TITO-FOPID method with
the proposed method. 30% parameter perturbation with time delay.

Similarly, according to (34), the value of Ms1 which

is the maximum sensitivity of loop 1 can be obtained as
1.2785 and Ms2 of loop 2 is equal to 1.2557. For fair
comparison, Ms1 = 1.2785 and Ms2 = 1.2557 are used as
a design specification in the proposed controller design
method. According to (42), the values of λi can be cal-
culated as λ1 = 0.6885 and λ2 = 0.6512. The following
FO-TITO-IMC controller can be obtained with the order
of k1 = k2 = 1 for simplicity:

2s0.5 + 1
C11 (s) = ,
1.2(1 + 0.6885s)
3s0.6 + 1
C22 (s) = . (57)
1.5(1 + 0.6512s) Fig. 12. Step response of the proposed method with 30%
parameter perturbation with time delay.
The closed-loop system step responses of TITO-FOPID
and the proposed method are shown in Fig. 10, when a unit
step input is set for the set-points at t = 0 s and t = 5 s. A proposed method is more robust to the time constant un-
step disturbances of the magnitude 0.1 are added into the certainty than the TITO-FOPID.
two inputs at t = 15 s. It can be seen from Fig. 10 that Fig. 15 is the manipulated variable input. In Fig. 16, a
the decoupling performance of the FO-TITO-IMC con- Gaussian white noisy with zero mean, which is the same
troller is better, because the overshoot of the proposed as Example 1 except the existence of time delay in the
method is smaller than the TITO-FOPID method, and the process, a variance of 0.1 and a frequency of 100Hz is
step responses of the proposed method is faster. The pro- added to the input signal. As is shown in Fig. 16, the
posed method reaches the steady-state from the distur- proposed method performs better in noisy rejection, since
bance faster than the TITO-FOPID method which means the output of the TITO-FOPID method is much noisy.
the proposed method perform better for disturbance rejec- Since the parameters of the controllers have been ob-
tion. tained, the stability of the system can be analyzed based
To test the robustness of the control system for process on the parameters. In Example. 2, According to (55), the
with time delay, a mismatch with a 30% parameter uncer- state space equation of loop 1 can be given as
tainty and a 50% time constants perturbation are added to [ ] [ ]
the system. Results of system gain perturbation are shown 0 1 0
ẋ = x+ u. (58)
in Fig. 11 and Fig. 12. Results of time constant pertur- 0 − (2 + 10λ1 ) 1
bation are shown in Fig. 13 and Fig. 14. As shown in So that, the state matrix A is shown as
Fig. 11 and Fig. 12, both of the methods provide a better
[ ]
robust performance with a 30% parameter perturbation. 0 1
A= . (59)
Comparing Fig. 13 and Fig. 14, it can be found that the 0 − (2 + 10λ1 )
 Fractional Order IMC Controller Design for Two-input-two-output Fractional Order System 945

Fig. 13. Step response of TITO-FOPID method with 50% Fig. 15. Manipulated variable input graphs with white
time constant perturbation with time delay. noisy.

Fig. 14. Step response of the proposed method with 50% Fig. 16. Tracking and disturbance rejection performance
time constant perturbation with time delay. of the proposed method with white noisy.

The form of a positive matrix P is So that, the state matrix A is shown as

[ ] [ ]
a11 a12 0 1
P= . (60) A= λ . (63)
a21 a22 0 − 3+10
1.5λ

According to the second method of Lyapunov, if there is The form of a positive matrix P is
a semi positive matrix Q which can satisfy (48) then the [ ]
system is stable. According to (48), we have a11 a12
P= . (64)
a21 a22
AT P + PA
[ ] According to the second method of Lyapunov, if there
0 a11 −(2+10λ1 )a12 is a semi positive matrix Q that can satisfy (48), then the
=
a11 −(2+10λ1 )a12 a12 +a21 −2∗(2+10λ1 )a22 system is stable. According to (48), we have
= −Q. (61)
AT P + PA
[ ]
It is obvious that there is a solution that can satisfy P is a 0 a11 − 3+10 λ2
= 1.5λ a12
positive matrix and Q is a semi positive matrix, this means λ2 λ2
a11 − 3+10
1.5λ2 a21 a12 + a21 − 2 ∗ 3+10
1.5λ2 a22
loop 1 is stable.
According to (55), the state space equation of Loop 2 = −Q. (65)
can be given as
There is a solution for (66) that can satisfy P is a pos-
[ ] [ ]
0 1 0 itive matrix and Q is a semi positive matrix. This means
ẋ = λ x + u. (62)
0 − 3+10
1.5λ
1 loop 2 is stable. Then the system is stable.
946 Dazi Li, Xingyu He, Tianheng Song, and Qibing Jin
5. CONCLUSION
In this paper, a simple approach for the design of an
inverted decoupling based FO-TITO-IMC controller for
FO-TITO process is proposed. Inverted decoupling is
used to eliminate or minimize the interaction between the
two primary loops. The FO system decoupled by inverted
decoupling could determine the two controllers separately.
IMC is used to reduce the parameters to be tuned, while
the structure of IMC provides the performance of set
point-tracking and disturbance rejection. Simulations re-
sults show that the proposed method is not sensitive to
the system parameter perturbation. The proposed con-
troller can be used in the situations without accurate sys-
tem model. The simple structure of the controller makes
it easy to be applied to industry. Because there are only
two parameters λ1 and λ2 need to be tuned, controller tun-
ing becomes very easy. The system stability is verified by
the second method of Lyapunov. In short, the FO-TITO-
IMC controller proposed in this paper provides ideal per-
formances for both set point-tracking and disturbance re-
jection with simple structure and easy tuned parameters.
Future work is to apply the method to FO-TITO process
with time delay [35, 36], and apply the fractional filter to
the FO-TITO-IMC controller design.
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947
Dazi Li received the Ph.D. degree in en-
gineering from the Department of Electri-
cal and Electronic Systems, Kyushu Uni-
versity, Fukuoka, Japan, in 2004. She is
currently a Full Professor and Chair of De-
partment of Automation, College of Infor-
mation Science and Technology, Beijing
University of Chemical Technology, Bei-
jing, China. Her current research interests
include machine learning and artificial intelligence, advanced
process control, complex system modeling and optimization. Dr.
Li is currently an Associate Editor of ISA Transactions.
Xingyu He received the B.S. degree in au-
tomation from the Department of Automa-
tion, Beijing University of Chemical Tech-
nology, Beijing, China, in 2011, where he
is currently pursuing the M.S. degree with
the College of Information Science and
Technology. His current research interests
include fractional order control.
Tianheng Song received the M.S. and
Ph.D. degrees in control science and engi-
neering from the Department of Automa-
tion, Beijing University of Chemical Tech-
nology, Beijing, China, in 2011 and 2016,
respectively, where he is currently a post-
doctoral fellow with the College of Infor-
mation Science and Technology. His cur-
rent research interests include reinforce-
ment learning.
Qibing jin received the Ph.D. degree
in control theory and engineering from
the Northeastern University, Shenyang,
Liaoning, China, in 1999. He is currently
a Full Professor with the college of In-
formation Science and Technology, the
Director of the Institute of Automation
with the Beijing University of Chemical
Technology, Beijing, China. His main re-
search interests include advanced control, intelligent instrument,
Intelligent optimization algorithm, multivariable system identi-
fication and control theory. He has rich experience in control
engineering, and his many research results have been applied in
petroleum and chemical industry.
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