Although it arose much earlier in a variety of contexts, sensitivity theory became an independent branch of science in the sixties. Since then, researchers from around the world have continued to make great strides in both the theory and its applications. However, much of the work of Russian scientific schools and specialists remain unknown in the West.
Sensitivity of Control Systems summarizes the results of the authors and their disciples in sensitivity theory, addressing the basic notions of the theory and the problem of selecting technical parameters of systems. The authors formulate...

The transfer function approach is widely used in classical control theory for its easy handling and physical meaning. Although the use of transfer functions is well-established for linear time-invariant systems, it is not suitable for non-stationary systems among which are sampled-data systems and processes with periodically varying coefficients. Computer-controlled continuous-time processes are a very important subset of periodic sampled-data systems which are not treatable using ordinary transfer functions.

Having established the ability of the parametric transfer function to...

Digital elements such as signal processors, microcontrollers or industrial PCs are widely used for filtering and control of continuous-time processes or plants. Because of the serial operation mode of these digital elements the continuous time processes cannot be served continuously. That is why continuous-time and discrete-time signals occur simultaneously in systems of this kind. The continuous (real) time also contains the discrete time instants - therefore, a complete and accurate description of such systems in continuous time is pos sible. However, this description proves to be more...