Fixed-time Descriptor Terminal Sliding Mode Control for Multi-DOF Mechanical Systems

Abstract

This study presents a fixed-time descriptor terminal sliding mode controller for the tracking control of multi-DOF (degree-of-freedom) mechanical systems. The descriptor representation is applied to the sliding surface design, which relaxes the robust stability conditions for chattering suppression. Furthermore, the proposed method attains fixed-time stability of the reaching and sliding mode. Both settling times are bounded by some fixed parameters of the controller and inertia matrix, which are independent of any initial conditions. Finally, simulations and an experiment using multi-DOF robot manipulators are conducted to validate the proposed controller.