MIMO sliding mode control of a distributed parameter denitrifying biofilter (Q5950117)

A sliding mode control law for a fixed bed bioreactor is designed. The dynamics of the bioreactor is specified by a set of partial differential equations with nonlinearities and time-varying parameters. First, an orthogonal collocation (weighted residual) method is applied to obtain a suitable lumped parameter dynamic model. Each state variable is expressed as a finite sum of products of time functions and space functions. Then early lumping and late lumping sliding mode control laws are elaborated. As a result the operating point of the system is brought to the sliding surface in the state space and is forced towards an equilibrium using switching control. The numerical simulation exposes good tracking and excellent performance of the proposed sliding mode controller. The set point has been tracked in spite of the distributed dynamics, nonlinearities, time-varying parameters and intensive external disturbances.