Complete controllability and contractibility in multimodal systems (Q1111978)

The paper introduces the concept of a strictly positive definite set of Hermitian matrices, in connection with positive definite sets, and conditions under which a positive definite set is strictly positive definite are found. The contractibility relative to an elliptic norm is studied for two-mode completely controllable irreducible multimodal systems. Necessary and sufficient conditions for special-type two-mode completely controllable irreducible systems to be contractible relative to a weakly monotone norm are also given. Finally, it is shown that for state dimension two there exists a completely controllable two-mode system which is not contractible to any of the above mentioned norms.