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Thursday 7 May

Systems and Control · Cross-listed from math.OC

Global self-optimizing control of batch processes

This work considers to achieve near-optimal operation for a class of batch processes by employing self-optimizing control (SOC). Comparing with a continuous one, a batch process exhibits stronger nonlinearity with dynamics because of the non-steady operation condition. This necessitates a global version of SOC to achieve satisfactory performance. Meanwhile, it also makes the existing global SOC (gSOC) not directly applicable to batch processes due to the causality amongst variables. Therefore, it is necessary to extend the original gSOC to batch processes. In addition to the nonconvexity challenge of the original gSOC problem, the new extension for batch processes has to face even more challenges. Particularly, the causality due to dynamics of batch processes brings in structural constraints on controlled variables (CVs), making a CV selection problem even more difficult. To address these challenges, the gSOC problem is recast in a vectorized formulation and it is proved that the structural constraints considered are linear in the vectorized formulation. Moreover, a novel shortcut method is proposed to efficiently find sub-optimal but more transparent solutions for this problem. The effectiveness of the new approach is validated through a case study of a fed-batch reactor, where CVs are constructed through a combination matrix with a repetitive structure, resulting in a simple SOC scheme. This simplicity facilitates the implementation of the SOC approach and enhances its practical applicability and robustness.
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All authors Chenchen Zhou, Hongxin Su, Xinhui Tang, Yi Cao, Shuang-hua Yang

Systems and Control · Cross-listed from cs.AI

ReasonSTL: Bridging Natural Language and Signal Temporal Logic via Tool-Augmented Process-Rewarded Learning

Signal Temporal Logic (STL) is an expressive formal language for specifying spatio-temporal requirements over real-valued, real-time signals. It has been widely used for the verification and synthesis of autonomous systems and cyber-physical systems. In practice, however, users often express their requirements in natural language rather than in structured STL formulas, making natural-language-to-STL translation a critical yet challenging task. Manual specification requires temporal-logic expertise and cannot scale, while prompting commercial LLM APIs incurs substantial token costs and may expose sensitive system requirements to third-party services, raising privacy concerns for industrial deployment. To address these challenges, we present ReasonSTL, a tool-augmented framework that adapts local open-source language models for natural-language-to-STL generation. ReasonSTL decomposes the translation process into explicit reasoning, deterministic tool calls, and structured formula construction. We further introduce process-rewarded training to supervise both tool-use trajectories and final formulas, together with STL-Bench, a bilingual, computation-aware benchmark grounded in real-world signals. Experiments show that a 4B model trained with ReasonSTL achieves state-of-the-art performance in both automatic metrics and human evaluations, demonstrating that ReasonSTL provides a transparent, low-cost, and privacy-preserving alternative for formal specification drafting.
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All authors Bowen Ye, Zhijian Li, Junyue Huang, Junkai Ma, Xiang Yin

Systems and Control · Cross-listed from math.OC

Dynamic Controlled Variables Based Dynamic Self-Optimizing Control

Self-optimizing control is a strategy for selecting controlled variables, where the economic objective guides the selection and design of controlled variables, with the expectation that maintaining the controlled variables at constant values can achieve optimization effects, translating the process optimization problem into a process control problem. Currently, self-optimizing control is widely applied to steady-state optimization problems. However, the development of process systems exhibits a trend towards refinement, highlighting the importance of optimizing dynamic processes such as batch processes and grade transitions. This paper formally introduces the self-optimizing control problem for dynamic optimization, termed the dynamic self-optimizing control problem, extending the original definition of self-optimizing control. A novel concept, "dynamic controlled variables" (DCVs), is proposed, and an implicit control policy is presented based on this concept. The paper theoretically analyzes the advantages and generality of DCVs compared to explicit control strategies and elucidates the relationship between DCVs and traditional controllers. Moreover, this paper puts forth a data-driven approach to designing self-optimizing DCVs, which considers DCV design as a mapping identification problem and employs deep neural networks to parameterize the variables. Three case studies validate the efficacy and superiority of DCVs in approximating multi-valued and discontinuous functions, as well as their application to dynamic optimization problems with non-fixed horizons, which traditional self-optimizing control methods are unable to address.
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All authors Chenchen Zhou, Shaoqi Wang, Hongxin Su, Xinhui Tang, Yi Cao, Shuang-Hua Yang

Systems and Control · Cross-listed from math.OC

Performance guaranteed MPC Policy Approximation via Cost Guided Learning

Model predictive control (MPC) is widely used in industries but implementing it poses challenges due to hardware or time constraints. A promising solution is to approximate the MPC policy using function approximators like neural networks. Existing methods focus on minimizing the error between the approximators outputs and the MPC optimal control actions on training data, which is called error guided learning approach in this paper. However, the goals of control law design is not to minimize the fitting error but to minimize the operation cost. This paper proposes a novel cost-guided learning approach that utilizes the cost sensitivity information from the MPC problem to directly minimize the loss in closed-loop performance. A theoretical analysis shows cost-guided learning provides tighter guarantees on optimality loss compared to traditional error-guided learning. Experiments on a continuous stirred tank reactor (CSTR) benchmark demonstrate that the proposed technique results in approximate MPC policies that achieve substantially better closed-loop performance. This work makes an important contribution by connecting the fitting errors with operational objectives, overcoming key limitations of existing approximation methods. The core idea could be applied more broadly for data-driven control.
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Systems and Control

Probabilistic Assessment of Rare Transient Instability Events via Kriging-based Active Learning Framework

The increasing uncertainty in modern power systems, driven by the integration of intermittent energy sources and variable loads, underscores the need for probabilistic transient stability assessment. However, existing assessment methods primarily focus on average system stability behavior and may struggle or incur high computational cost when identifying rare transient instability events, which in turn are critical for ensuring system resilience. To address this, the paper proposes a Kriging-based active learning framework to accurately characterize rare instability regions within the input uncertainty space and estimate the associated small instability probability, while requiring only a limited number of expensive time-domain simulations. The proposed active learning (AL) framework is tested on a modified IEEE 59-bus system with simulated load and wind uncertainties, and a WECC 240-bus system incorporating real-world wind and solar generation data. Comparative studies with the existing random forest-based active learning method and three non-AL methods demonstrate that the proposed AL framework achieves superior accuracy and computational efficiency.
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Systems and Control

Distributed Online Learning for Time-Critical Communication in 6G Industrial Subnetworks

Reliable and timely delivery of emergency alarms is critical for 6G industrial in-X subnetworks, particularly in dense and dynamic environments where multiple devices may simultaneously detect the same event and contend for limited radio resources. This scenario, known as medium access with a shared message, poses significant challenges for conventional random access protocols due to collisions and stringent trans- mission deadlines. To address this challenge, this paper proposes a distributed deep contextual-bandit-based random access pro- tocol that minimizes the probability of alarm delivery deadline violations. The proposed protocol enables each local access point (LAP) to autonomously learn its transmission strategy through a lightweight deep neural network (DNN), without requiring knowledge of the number of active LAPs or explicit inter-LAP coordination. A contention-signature acquisition mechanism is introduced to provide contextual information about network contention, enabling distributed and adaptive channel-access decisions. Moreover, an online learning mechanism allows LAPs to continuously refine their transmission strategies based on feedback from previous alarm transmissions. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed protocol outperforms benchmark random access schemes, particularly under high-contention con- ditions, improving the probability of timely alarm delivery by at least 8% with 30 subnetworks and up to 21% with 60 subnetworks.
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Systems and Control

Residual-Corrected Equivalent-Circuit Model with Universal Differential Equations for Robust Battery Voltage Prediction under Operating-Condition Shift

Accurate terminal-voltage prediction underpins model-based battery management, yet low-order equivalent-circuit models (\ecm{}) lack expressiveness under transient conditions, whereas purely data-driven predictors sacrifice interpretability and may degrade under operating-condition shift. This paper introduces a residual-corrected hybrid formulation in which a first-order Thevenin \ecm{} (\ecmrc{}) provides the dominant voltage structure, and a compact neural network embedded as a universal differential equation (\ude{}) corrects only the latent polarization mismatch. The \ecmrc{} parameters identified by nonlinear least squares warm-start the hybrid model so that the learned component operates in a low-residual regime. Experiments on a public Panasonic 18650PF dataset compare the proposed \ecmude{} with standalone \ecmrc{} and Long Short-Term Memory (\lstm{}) baselines across four axes: matched-condition prediction on UDDS at \SI{25}{\celsius}, inference-time perturbation of the supplied state-of-charge (\SOC{}, denoted $z$) input, zero-shot temperature transfer (\SI{25}{\celsius} to \SI{-20}{\celsius}), and zero-shot drive-cycle transfer to US06, LA92, and HWFET. The proposed \ecmude{} achieves the lowest voltage error in every setting, reducing mean absolute error (\mae{}) by 48% relative to the \lstm{} under matched conditions and showing an order-of-magnitude lower inter-seed variability (coefficient of variation: 0.44% vs.\ 6.20%). Substantial gains persist under challenging distribution shifts, indicating that the physical model anchors prediction where a purely learned model is most vulnerable. These results position residual-corrected \ecmude{} as a lightweight and interpretable enhancement of low-order circuit models for voltage prediction in battery management systems (\bms{}).
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Audio and Speech Processing

WavCube: Unifying Speech Representation for Understanding and Generation via Semantic-Acoustic Joint Modeling

Integrating speech understanding and generation is a pivotal step toward building unified speech models. However, the different representations required for these two tasks currently pose significant compatibility challenges. Typically, semantics-oriented features are learned from self-supervised learning (SSL), and acoustic-oriented features from reconstruction. Such fragmented representations hinder the realization of truly unified speech systems. We present WavCube, a compact continuous latent derived from an SSL speech encoder that simultaneously supports speech understanding, reconstruction, and generation. WavCube employs a two-stage training scheme. Stage 1 trains a semantic bottleneck to filter off-manifold redundancy that makes raw SSL features intractable for diffusion. Stage 2 injects fine-grained acoustic details via end-to-end reconstruction, while a semantic anchoring loss ensures the representation remains grounded within its original semantic manifold. Comprehensive experiments show that WavCube closely approaches WavLM performance on SUPERB despite an 8x dimensional compression, attains reconstruction quality on par with existing acoustic representations, delivers state-of-the-art zero-shot TTS performance with markedly faster training convergence, and excels in speech enhancement, separation, and voice conversion tasks on the SUPERB-SG benchmark. Systematic ablations reveal that WavCube's two-stage recipe resolves two intrinsic flaws of SSL features for generative modeling, paving the way for future unified speech systems. Codes and checkpoints are available at https://github.com/yanghaha0908/WavCube.
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All authors Guanrou Yang, Tian Tan, Qian Chen, Zhikang Niu, Yakun Song, Ziyang Ma, Yushen Chen, Zeyu Xie, Tianrui Wang, Yifan Yang, Wenxi Chen, Qi Chen, Wenrui Liu, Shan Yang, Xie Chen

Signal Processing · Cross-listed from cs.LG

Consistent Geometric Deep Learning via Hilbert Bundles and Cellular Sheaves

Modern deep learning architectures increasingly contend with sophisticated signals that are natively infinite-dimensional, such as time series, probability distributions, or operators, and are defined over irregular domains. Yet, a unified learning theory for these settings has been lacking. To start addressing this gap, we introduce a novel convolutional learning framework for possibly infinite-dimensional signals supported on a manifold. Namely, we use the connection Laplacian associated with a Hilbert bundle as a convolutional operator, and we derive filters and neural networks, dubbed as HilbNets. We make HilbNets and, more generally, the convolution operation, implementable via a two-stage sampling procedure. First, we show that sampling the manifold induces a Hilbert Cellular Sheaf, a generalized graph structure with Hilbert feature spaces and edge-wise coupling rules, and we prove that its sheaf Laplacian converges in probability to the underlying connection Laplacian as the sampling density increases. Notably, this result is a generalization to the infinite-dimensional bundle setting of the Belkin & Niyogi \cite{BELKIN20081289} convergence result for the graph Laplacian to the manifold Laplacian, a theoretical cornerstone of geometric learning methods. Second, we discretize the signals and prove that the discretized (implementable) HilbNets converge to the underlying continuous architectures and are transferable across different samplings of the same bundle, providing consistency for learning. Finally, we validate our framework on synthetic and real-world tasks. Overall, our results broaden the scope of geometric learning as a whole by lifting classical Laplacian-based frameworks to settings where the signal at each point lives in its own Hilbert space.
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All authors Kartik Tandon, Julian Gould, Tanishq Bhatia, Francesca Dominici, Alejandro Ribeiro, Claudio Battiloro

Systems and Control · Cross-listed from math.OC

Unbalanced Optimal Transport and Density Control for Discrete-Time Linear Systems

This article studies unbalanced optimal transport (UOT) and its dynamical extension, unbalanced density control (UDC), for a class of constrained discrete-time linear systems. UOT compares measures with unequal total mass by balancing transport cost and fidelity to reference measures, while UDC incorporates system dynamics and constraints into this framework. Focusing on Gaussian references and discrete-time linear systems, we show that both problems admit globally optimal convex formulations, analogous to covariance steering. A numerical experiment is provided to illustrate our approach.
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2605.06391 · 7 May · To appear in the Proceedings of MTNS 2026 (extended abstracts). Submitted on February 15, 2026; accepted on April 20, 2026. A significantly expanded version containing additional theoretical results, complete proofs, and numerical experiments, is available at: arXiv:2605.04246v1

Signal Processing

Hybrid Pinching-Fluid Antenna Assisted Wireless Communications: Modeling and Performance Analysis

Reconfigurable-antenna systems have received increasing attention for their ability to adapt wireless channels. However, existing architectures exhibit scenario-dependent limitations: fluid antennas provide strong diversity gains in rich-scattering environments but offer limited benefits under line-of-sight (LoS)-dominant conditions, while pinching antennas can effectively reduce path loss by adjusting the radiation point along a waveguide, yet perform poorly in severe non-LoS (NLoS) scenarios. This letter proposes a hybrid pinching-fluid antenna system (HPFAS), where pinching antenna (PA) is employed at the transmitter and a fluid antenna (FA) is used at the receiver to jointly exploit LoS enhancement and spatial diversity. A tractable channel model is developed, and outage probability expressions are derived for both single-user and multi-user scenarios. Simulation results validate the analysis and show that the proposed HPFAS consistently outperforms systems using only pinching antennas or only fluid antennas under various propagation conditions.
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All authors Xiao Lin, Yizhe Zhao, Xiangyang Wang, Halvin Yang, Bingxin Zhang

Signal Processing

The frame-level leakage trap: rethinking evaluation protocols for intrinsic image decomposition, with source-separable uncertainty as a case study

Evaluation protocols for learned intrinsic image decomposition on MPI Sintel have been inconsistent. Several prior works split the dataset by frames, which allows spatially similar frames of the same scene to appear in both train and test partitions. We quantify this leakage effect for the first time, across three architectures: a frame-level split inflates test R_PSNR by 1.6 to 2.0 dB (p less than 0.01 for all three, paired t-test across 3 seeds) relative to a scene-level split, confirming an architecture-independent protocol effect. A three-point gradient (random/temporal/scene) shows the gap is continuous, and under extended training the frame-level inflation exceeds 10 dB. We advocate scene-level splits as the community standard and provide reference numbers for six representative models under this protocol. As a case study within the corrected protocol, we present a physics-informed decomposition I = R composed with S + N with a source-separable three-way heteroscedastic uncertainty head. We empirically verify channel specialization: the non-Lambertian uncertainty channel shows r = 0.67 cross-correlation with non-Lambertian residual error, more than 4 times the texture channel's correlation. We further demonstrate downstream utility: filtering out the 75% highest-uncertainty pixels reduces reconstruction MSE by 77% on retained pixels, whereas random filtering produces no improvement. The specialization also holds on out-of-distribution real photographs. We report negative results for a more elaborate variant combining frequency decomposition, cross-task supervision, evidential learning, contrastive loss, and test-time adaptation. Our method reaches 15.98 plus or minus 0.41 dB R_PSNR, within 0.8 dB of a 5-member Deep Ensemble at one-fifth the cost, with the unique capability of source-separated uncertainty.
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Signal Processing

Cooperative Multi-Static Target Localization for ISAC in Cluttered Industrial IoT Networks

In this paper, we propose a novel integrated sensing and communications (ISAC) framework for collaborative multi-static target localization in dense Industrial Internet-of-Things (IIoT) environments in the presence of environmental clutter. We first develop a lightweight temporal clutter-suppression learning method to mitigate persistent reflections. Building on this, we propose an iterative localization algorithm that integrates two key components introduced in this work: a sampling-based field-of-view-aware initialization (SFI) scheme and an empirical position error bound (PEB) scheme, which together adaptively identify the most informative subset of sensing nodes. A reliability-aware weighted least-squares estimator is then employed to fuse range and angle-of-arrival measurements from the selected sensing receivers for target localization. Numerical results demonstrate rapid convergence of the proposed method, reducing the localization RMSE by nearly two orders of magnitude within six sensing iterations to about 45 cm, while significantly outperforming all considered benchmarks under the same sensing-resource budget.
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Signal Processing

Orthogonal Least Squares with Integrated Information Theoretic Criteria for Joint Number of Targets and DoA Estimation

We address the joint estimation of the number of targets and their direction-of-arrivals (DoAs) using antenna arrays. Target-number estimation can be formulated as a model-order selection problem and solved with the information theoretic criteria (ITC). The ITC minimize an objective function that balances a likelihood term and a complexity penalty. However, direct application of the ITC requires maximum-likelihood DoA estimates for each candidate model order, which is computationally prohibitive because it entails a multidimensional search over all angle combinations. To reduce complexity, many radar processing exploit greedy methods such as orthogonal least squares (OLS). In this paper, we explore three distinct methods to integrate the ITC model-order selection into the OLS estimation procedure for joint target-number and DoA estimation. Specifically, we propose the disjoint rank-based, the joint selection-based, and the hybrid rank-and-selection-based ITC-OLS algorithms. Each algorithm is derived under both the Akaike information criterion (AIC) and the Bayesian information criterion (BIC) frameworks. Numerical simulations show that the proposed hybrid ITC-OLS algorithm consistently outperforms both the other proposed variants and a baseline method from the literature.
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All authors Martin Willame, Gilles Monnoyer, François Horlin, Jérôme Louveaux

Audio and Speech Processing

Predictive-Generative Drift Decomposition for Speech Enhancement and Separation

We propose a plug-and-play framework for speech enhancement and separation that augments predictive methods with a generative speech prior. Our approach, termed Stochastic Interpolant Prior for Speech (SIPS), builds on stochastic interpolants and leverages their flexibility to bridge predictive and generative modeling. Specifically, we decompose the interpolation dynamics into a task-specific drift and a stochastic denoising component, allowing a predictive estimate to be integrated directly into the generative sampling process. This results in a mathematically grounded framework for combining strong pretrained predictors with the expressive power of generative models. To this end, we train a score model using only clean speech, yielding a degradation-agnostic prior that can be reused across tasks. During inference, the predictor provides a deterministic drift that steers the sampling process toward a task-consistent estimate, while the score model preserves perceptual naturalness. Unlike prior hybrid approaches, which typically rely on architecture-specific conditioning and are tied to particular predictors or degradation settings, SIPS provides a unified framework that generalizes across predictors and additive degradation tasks. We demonstrate its effectiveness for both speech enhancement and speech separation using recent predictors such as SEMamba and FlexIO. The proposed method consistently improves perceptual quality, achieving gains up +1.0 NISQA for speech separation.
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All authors Julius Richter, Yoshiki Masuyama, Christoph Boeddeker, Takahiro Edo, Gordon Wichern, Jonathan Le Roux

Systems and Control

Synthesis of Limit Cycles and Reference Tracking via Switching Affine Systems

This paper introduces a novel method to approximate limit cycles of nonlinear ODEs by use of switching affine dynamics in order to ease data-based modeling and analysis. Previous approaches to approximating limit cycles by switching systems have been largely confined to simple partitions into two-regions or low-dimensional (often planar) settings. In contrast, this study utilizes more general partitions in higher-dimensional state spaces, augmented by external signals, to develop a synthesis scheme that guarantees a globally stable limit cycle. The synthesis task is formulated and solved based on constrained numerical optimization. Starting from sampled data of the nonlinear dynamics, the method minimizes the error between the data and the limit cycle generated by the switching affine model, while employing stability constraints to ensure global stability. Based on the obtained model, the paper tackles the problem of reference tracking for switching affine systems with periodic behavior. While the approximation scheme is based on a common Lyapunov function, the reference tracking approach uses multiple Lyapunov functions to achieve less conservative convergence results. The principle and effectiveness of the proposed methods are illustrated through a set of examples.
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Systems and Control · Cross-listed from cs.LG

Unifying Goal-Conditioned RL and Unsupervised Skill Learning via Control-Maximization

Unsupervised pretraining has driven empirical advances in goal-conditioned reinforcement learning (GCRL), but its theoretical foundations remain poorly understood. In particular, an influential class of methods, mutual information skill learning (MISL), discovers behaviorally diverse skills that can later be used for downstream goal-reaching. However, it remains a theoretical mystery why skills learned through MISL should support goal-reaching. A subtle challenge is that both GCRL and MISL are umbrella terms: Different GCRL tasks use distinct criteria for measuring goal-reaching performance, while different MISL methods optimize distinct notions of behavioral diversity. We address this challenge and unify GCRL and MISL as instances of control maximization. We identify three canonical GCRL formulations and prove that they are fundamentally inequivalent: They can induce incompatible optimal policies even in the same environment. Nevertheless, they all share a common interpretation: A well-performing goal-conditioned policy is one whose future trajectory is highly sensitive to the commanded goal, with the precise notion of sensitivity determined by the GCRL formulation. Noting that MISL objectives can be understood as measures of skill sensitivity akin to goal sensitivity, we show that MISL objectives are bounded by formulation-specific downstream goal sensitivities. These bounds establish a precise correspondence between MISL methods and downstream GCRL tasks: For every GCRL formulation, there exists a matching MISL objective for which more diverse skills afford greater downstream goal sensitivity. Our results thus lay a theoretical foundation for RL pretraining and have important practical implications, such as suggesting which pretraining objectives to use when a user cares about a specific class of downstream tasks.
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All authors Alireza Modirshanechi, Benjamin Eysenbach, Peter Dayan, Eric Schulz

Audio and Speech Processing

NDF+: Joint Neural Directional Filtering and Diffuse Sound Extraction

Recently, neural directional filtering (NDF) has been introduced as a flexible approach for reconstructing a virtual directional microphone (VDM) with a desired directivity pattern for spatial sound capture. Building on this idea, we propose NDF+, which enables joint neural directional filtering and diffuse sound extraction. NDF+ reformulates VDM estimation into two coupled subtasks: dereverberated VDM reconstruction and diffuse sound extraction. This reformulation enables NDF+ to manipulate diffuse components in the final reconstructed VDM output. We evaluated NDF+ under reverberant conditions and compared it with representative conventional baselines. Results show that NDF+ consistently outperforms the baselines on both subtasks, while maintaining VDM reconstruction quality comparable to that of the original single-task NDF model. These findings indicate that NDF+ introduces an additional degree of freedom for diffuse sound control in the VDM reconstruction. In a stereo recording application, NDF+ provides controllable inter-channel level differences between left and right channels by adjusting the estimated diffuse component.
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All authors Weilong Huang, Le Nhat Tam Huynh, Oliver Thiergart, Emanuël A. P. Habets

Signal Processing

A Family of Hybrid Beyond-Diagonal RIS Architectures: Design and Performance Analysis

Beyond-diagonal reconfigurable intelligent surfaces (BD-RISs) extend conventional diagonal RISs by allowing inter-element coupling, thereby enlarging the set of attainable scattering matrices and improving the achievable signal-to-noise ratio (SNR). On the other hand, hybrid active/passive RISs use reflect-type power amplifiers in a fraction of the elements to alleviate the multiplicative path loss. In this paper, we bring these two ideas together and introduce a family of hybrid BD-RIS architectures, in which the surface is partitioned into two reflecting subsurfaces (RSs), each adopting either a passive or an active group-connected BD-RIS design. We derive a closed-form SNR-maximizing solution that combines, for every BD-RIS group, Takagi's factorization of a certain complex symmetric matrix with an optimal per-group amplification factor that satisfies the reflect-power budget. Three architectures within the proposed family (active/passive, fully-connected-active/sub-connected-active, and sub-connected-active/sub-connected-active hybrid BD-RIS) are studied. Numerical results in a single-input single-output (SISO) link with blocked direct path show that the proposed hybrid BD-RIS architectures attain the same or higher receive SNR than their diagonal counterparts while using significantly fewer reflect-type amplifiers.
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Signal Processing

CredibleDFGO: Differentiable Factor Graph Optimization with Credibility Supervision

Global navigation satellite system (GNSS) positioning is widely used for urban navigation, but the covariance reported by the GNSS solver is often unreliable in urban canyons. Existing differentiable factor graph optimization (DFGO) methods learn measurement weighting through the solver, but they still use position-only objectives. As a result, the position estimate may improve while the reported covariance remains too small, too large, or incorrectly oriented. We propose CredibleDFGO (CDFGO), a differentiable GNSS factor graph framework that makes covariance credibility an explicit training target. A Weighting Generation Network (WGN) predicts per-satellite reliability weights, and a differentiable Gauss-Newton solver maps these weights to a position estimate and a Hessian-derived posterior covariance. We use proper scoring rules to supervise the East-North predictive distribution end to end. We study negative log-likelihood (NLL), the energy score (ES), and their combination. Results on three UrbanNav test scenes show consistent gains in covariance credibility. Positioning accuracy also improves on the medium-urban and harsh-urban scenes; on the deep-urban scene, both the mean horizontal error and the 95th-percentile error improve. On the harsh-urban Mong Kok (MK) scene, CDFGO-Combined reduces the mean horizontal error from 13.77 m to 11.68 m, reduces NLL from 40.63 to 6.59, and reduces ES from 12.31 to 9.05 relative to DFGO (MAE). Case studies link the MK improvement to better axis-wise consistency, more credible local covariance ellipses, and satellite-level reweighting.
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All authors Liang Qian, Penggao Yan, Penghui Xu, Li-Ta Hsu

Systems and Control

Absolute Stability of Nonlinear Negative Imaginary Systems with Application to Potential Energy Shaping

This paper establishes absolute stability conditions for nonlinear negative imaginary (NI) systems interconnected with static nonlinear feedback. We first show that the NI property is preserved when the feedback nonlinearity can be expressed as the gradient of a continuously differentiable function, and the composite storage of the resulting system remains positive definite. This condition provides a direct connection between nonlinear static feedback and storage-function shaping along the measured output channels. Building on this result, conditions are derived for absolute stability of the closed-loop system under mild assumptions. The linear specialization of the results strictly generalizes prior absolute stability results for linear NI systems, allowing coupled nonlinearities not covered by existing slope-restricted or sector-bounded frameworks. Finally, the proposed theory is illustrated through a linear example highlighting this generalization and a nonlinear example that shows the utility of the proposed results in potential energy shaping.
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Systems and Control · Cross-listed from cs.AI

Safety Certification is Classification

The goal of this paper is certifying safety of dynamical systems subject to uncertainty. Existing approaches use trajectory data to estimate transition probabilities, and compute safety probabilities recursively via dynamic programming (DP). This recursion may lead to compounding errors in the certified safety probability, thus collapsing to a vacuous lower bound for growing horizons $T$. We propose a kernel embedding framework that treats safety certification as a classification problem on trajectory data, directly estimating the $T$-step safety probability without recursion. We show that the framework subsumes well-established approaches from the literature (e.g., barrier certificates, robust Markov models) as special cases, and allows us to go beyond their limitations. As the main consequence, it bypasses compounding error across the horizon and enables certification for systems with non-Markovian dynamics. We demonstrate that direct estimators remain stable independent of the certification horizon and in the non-Markovian setting, whilst DP-based certificates silently go unsound – confirmed in simulation on a neural-controlled quadrotor.
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Systems and Control · Cross-listed from cs.RO

Monitoring autonomous persistent surveillance missions using invariance

This paper studies runtime monitoring for persistent surveillance by autonomous robots when the autonomy stack is a black box. The environment is partitioned into finitely many parts, each carrying an uncertainty state that decreases when observed and increases otherwise. We model the closed loop as a state-dependent hybrid system with linear parameter varying dynamics and design a monitor based on an invariant computed offline. As this invariant is typically hard to obtain for large to-be-surveyed spaces, we propose a compositional monitor obtained by decentralized computation of low-dimensional invariant sets for each uncertainty region, and checking their conjunction online. Under common independence assumptions, the compositional monitor is sound and complete with respect to the full-system invariant. The approach is applied in a case study with a real robot persistently monitoring a labyrinth, emphasizing its applicability in practice.
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Systems and Control · Cross-listed from cs.CE

Arbitrage and the Stability of AMM Price Tracking

Automated market makers (AMMs) quote prices from pool state rather than from a limit order book. AMM pools often stay close to a reference price because arbitrageurs correct profitable mispricing. A large part of decentralized finance therefore relies on a simple economic premise: once the AMM price drifts away from the reference price, arbitrage incentives push it back. This paper studies when that premise is strong enough to guarantee block-scale stability. We model the gap between the reference price and the AMM price as a stochastic tracking error, treat arbitrage as the corrective input, and place blockchain execution inside the loop through fees, discrete blocks, transaction ordering, delays, and transaction failure. The detailed execution layer is reduced to the total successful correction confirmed in each block. Under a block-level correction condition, we prove geometric ergodicity of the tracking error and obtain explicit one-step bounds that connect tracking quality to liquidity and execution quality. We also show in a constant-product example how fees, fixed execution costs, and local liquidity map into the no-trade band and the optimal corrective trade. Finally, we build empirical proxies for the theorem quantities from realized block data and use them to organize reduced and mechanism-focused simulations whose comparative statics are consistent with the theory. The contribution is to turn a basic economic intuition behind decentralized finance into a quantitative stability statement together with a tractable calibration interface.
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Systems and Control

Kirigami-Structured Electronic Capsule for Long-Term Continuous Gastric Monitoring

Ingestible electronic systems enable non-invasive, in situ sensing within the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, yet clinical translation has been limited by uncontrolled transit, short operational lifetimes, and unreliable wireless communication that prevent continuous monitoring. Here, we present a gastric-resident ingestible robotic platform that achieves week-long operation through integration of a bioinspired, electrically triggered release mechanism with a kirigami-enabled electronic architecture. A kirigami-patterned flexible printed circuit board spans the capsule body and deployable superelastic arms, enabling high-density integration of sensing, power management, and wireless modules within a constrained volume while tolerating large mechanical deformation during gastric residence. Stable retention and on-demand disassembly are achieved using thermally responsive polycaprolactone joints that transition from rigid to compliant states under electrical activation, avoiding dependence on variable chemical triggers. Reliable telemetry in the highly attenuating gastric environment is maintained using a dual-band Bluetooth Low Energy and sub-gigahertz module with RSSI- and throughput-aware adaptive transmission, balancing link robustness and energy consumption. We demonstrate long-term, continuous monitoring of gastric radiation exposure, enabling early detection of dose accumulation and providing a promising in vivo alternative to wearable or handheld dosimeters. Swine studies confirm stable gastric residence, sustained real-time telemetry, and safe gastrointestinal passage following triggered disassembly. This work establishes kirigami-enabled integration as a scalable strategy for long-term gastric-resident robotic systems.
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All authors Hen-Wei Huang, Claas Ehmke, Dawei Wang, Blake Smith, Ziyao Zhou, Rong Tan, David Werder, Crystan McLymore, Niels Neidlein, Emanuele Falli, Ali Imani, James McRae, Yeseul Jeon, So-Yoon Yang, Wesley S. Culberson, James Byrne, Giovanni Traverso

2605.06045 · 7 May · This submission is withdrawn because the author/contributor information in the current version was submitted before explicit confirmation had been obtained from all relevant team members. We are withdrawing the article to avoid an inaccurate or unverified authorship/contribution record

Signal Processing

Bayesian Learning-Aided Near-Field Channel Estimation for mmWave Hybrid MIMO systems employing Uniform Circular Array

This work conceives a Ring-Bayes channel learning framework that unifies Bayesian learning with near-field channel estimation in millimeter-wave (mmWave) hybrid MIMO systems. As the number of antennas scales up, users increasingly fall within the near-field region, rendering the conventional planar-wave assumption invalid. Moreover, the widely studied uniform linear arrays (ULAs) at the base station are impractical for large-scale deployment, whereas uniform circular arrays (UCAs) achieve superior beamforming gain and spatial directivity with the same antenna aperture. To exploit these advantages, we design a near-field concentric-ring codebook that captures channel features jointly in angular and distance domains. Leveraging this structure, the proposed Ring-Bayes framework enables highly accurate recovery of UCA near-field channels. Extensive simulations confirm that our approach delivers substantial improvements over existing methods, establishing Ring-Bayes as a powerful and scalable solution for next-generation mmWave communications.
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All authors Abhisha Garg, Priya Gupta, Suraj Srivastava, Aditya Jagannatham

Systems and Control

SOPF-Based Adaptive Droop Control for Hybrid AC–HVDC Grids Under Offshore Wind Uncertainty

The integration of massive offshore wind into hybrid AC-HVDC grids demands robust DC voltage regulation, yet conventional fixed-gain droop controllers struggle under severe stochastic volatility. This paper bridges the gap between system-level economic dispatch and converter-level control by proposing a novel Stochastic Optimal Power Flow (SOPF)-based adaptive droop framework. Rather than relying on heuristic or reactive tuning, wind forecast uncertainty is modeled using a zone-wise Beta distribution that accurately captures the heteroscedastic nature of wind errors across low, mid, and high power regimes. By leveraging Polynomial Chaos Expansion (PCE) within a chance-constrained SOPF, the system's stochastic states are formulated analytically. Crucially, the optimal adaptive droop gain is extracted directly from the first-order PCE coefficients via a Jacobian-free sensitivity analysis, embedding statistical voltage-security guarantees directly into the local converter control. Validation on a 4-terminal AC-HVDC system demonstrates that scenario-adaptive gains significantly outperform standard fixed-coefficient approaches, effectively minimizing active-power tracking errors during extreme wind disturbances.
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Systems and Control

Community-to-Vehicle: Integrating Electric Vehicles into Energy Communities – A Swiss Case Study

The institutional separation between local energy communities and public electric vehicle (EV) charging limits the efficient use of locally generated renewable energy. This paper introduces the concept of community-to-vehicle (C2V) as an institutional design mechanism to bridge this gap by enabling EV charging within the community boundary, where locally generated photovoltaic (PV) surplus is preferentially allocated and offered to external users at a community charging price. Building on the recently introduced local electricity community framework in Switzerland, we design scenarios that capture the transition from full separation to coordinated EV charging and evaluate their impacts on EV users and the community. The results show that C2V significantly improves local PV utilization and enhances economic performance, reducing EV charging costs relative to commercial alternatives while generating additional revenue streams for the community. These findings highlight the potential of C2V as a practical, implementable mechanism for integrating EV charging into local energy communities, providing a clear pathway for adopting coordinated community-EV interaction within existing regulatory frameworks.
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All authors Na Li, Dong Liu, Stavros Orfanoudakis, Özge Okur, N. K. Panda, Pedro P. Vergara, Binod Koirala

Systems and Control

Foundation Twins: A New Generation of Power Systems Digital Twins using Foundation AI Models

Power systems are inherently multi-timescale systems, with different physical phenomena and decision-making processes spanning multiple timescales, time horizons, and geographic scopes. I envision power systems digital twins (DTs) as powerful modeling and simulation tools that can accelerate and improve decision-making across different time scales and geographic scopes. However, until now, research has not delivered such a vision, and power systems DTs remain a concept distant from implementation. This is not a regular research paper. This is a position paper that outlines my vision for developing a new generation of power systems DTs that leverage recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). I call these Foundation Twins. Foundation Twins combines the generalization features of foundation models with the decision-making capabilities of reinforcement learning (RL) architectures to deliver the envisioned power systems DTs.
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Systems and Control

Consideration of Control-Loop Interaction in Transient Stability of Grid-Following Inverters using Bandwidth Separation Method

Grid-following inverters have been widely adopted as a grid interface for renewable energy, and ensuring their small-signal and large-signal stability is critical to modern power systems. Their large-signal, or transient, stability is a significant challenge to analyze because of the interaction of the phase-locked loop (PLL), which must maintain synchronism with various outer-loop controllers. Simple analysis in which outer-loop controllers are idealized is insufficient, and the interactions between the nonlinear dynamics of the PLL and the dynamics of the DC-link voltage control (DVC), as well as the AC terminal voltage control (TVC) when present, must be considered. An asymptotic analysis approach, termed the bandwidth separation method, is proposed. This method enables simplification and order reduction of the original differential equations when sufficient bandwidth separation exists. Through this method, the interaction between the DVC and PLL is explicitly characterized, revealing that such interaction degrades system stability and shrinks the stability region. The analysis also indicates that voltage instability, rather than PLL loss of synchronization alone, is often the root cause of transient instability. Optimal bandwidth configurations for the PLL and DVC are identified under various grid fault conditions: a larger PLL bandwidth improves resilience to phase-jump faults, while a larger DVC bandwidth enhances tolerance to power fluctuations. In addition, the influence of the TVC loop is analyzed, showing that a high TVC bandwidth can mitigate the destabilizing effects of PLL-DVC interaction and further improve transient stability. All analytical findings are validated through hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) experiments.
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All authors Yifan Zhang, Yunjie Gu, Yue Zhu, Yitong Li, Hsiao-Dong Chiang, Timothy C. Green