Design of plug-and-play model predictive control: an approach based on linear programming

In this paper we consider a linear system represented by subsystems coupled through states and propose a distributed control scheme for guaranteeing asymptotic stability and satisfaction of constraints on system inputs and states. Our design procedure enables Plug-and-Play (PnP) operations, meaning that (i) the addition or removal of subsystems triggers the synthesis of local controllers associated to successors to the subsystem only and (ii) the synthesis of a local controller for a subsystem requires information only from predecessors of the subsystem and it can be performed using only local computational resources. Our method, that is based on Model Predictive Control (MPC) advances the PnP design procedure proposed in [1] in several directions. Notably, we show how critical steps in the design of a local controller can be solved through linear programming.