Actuator Placement Optimization and Adaptive Vibration

Control of Plate Smart Structures

FUJUN PENG,* ALFRED NG AND YAN-RU HU
Directorate of Spacecraft Engineering, Canadian Space Agency, St.Hubert, QC, J3Y 8Y9, Canada
ABSTRACT: In this paper, a performance criterion is proposed for the optimization of
piezoelectric patch actuator locations on flexible plate structures based on maximizing
the controllability grammian. This is followed by the determination of parameters required
for actuator location optimization through Structuring Analysis in ANSYS Finite Element
Analysis Package. Genetic Algorithm is then used to implement the optimization. Finally,
with the actuators bonded on optimized locations, a filtered-x LMS-based multichannel
adaptive control is applied to suppress vibration response of the plate. Numerical simulations
are performed in suppressing tri-sinusoidal response at three points of the plates. The results
show that the developed actuator placement optimization methodology is very effective in
searching for the optimal actuator locations that minimize the energy requirement of vibration
control. The control algorithm is also demonstrated to be efficient and robust in the smart
structure vibration control.
Key Words: smart structures, piezoelectric, actuator placement optimization, adaptive
vibration control.
INTRODUCTION
S
MART materials and structures have attracted much
attention due to their potential advantages in a
wide range of applications, such as aeronautical and
aerospace engineering, civil engineering, automobile
engineering, precision instruments and machines, etc.
Different types of sensors and actuators have been
developed using piezoelectric ceramics, shape memory
alloys, electrorheological fluids, magnetostrictive mate-
rial, optical fibers, etc. In the field of structure shape
and vibration control, piezoelectric materials received
the most attention because of their features, such as
low mass, high bandwidth, low cost, ease of bonding
onto or embedding within flexible structures, etc.
(Banks et al., 1996). In most cases, multiple piezoelectric
material sensors and actuators are used and distributed
on some specifically designed locations of the controlled
structure. Combining with some types of control
methods, these actuators apply control forces to the
structure in a designed manner and thus the structure
can be deformed into a required shape or maintained in
a level of vibration.
For aerospace applications, the amount of energy
consumption is always a concern in the vibration
control of smart structures. It has been shown that the
control system performance can be improved signif-
icantly if actuators are placed at optimal locations, and
at the same time the energy consumption could be
minimized. On the contrary, placing an actuator near
a nodal point (or line) of a structure mode could result
in large force requirement, or even cause an inability to
control this mode. In this paper, we consider a thin
rectangular cantilever aluminum plate, on which four
piezoelectric patches are to be bonded to control its
vibration. This kind of problem has been investigated by
a number of authors (Han and Lee, 1999; Sadri et al.,
1999; Liu et al., 2002), but we derive a new performance
criterion starting from a general case of sensor and
actuator distributions (Hac and Liu, 1993). We extend
the controllability grammian in the work of Hac and Liu
(1993) from the point actuator case to the piezoelectric
patch actuator case, where an actuator applies forces on
a piece area instead of a point. The parameters in the
derived controllability grammian are clear in physical
meanings. By performing Structuring Analysis in
ANSYS, the order of the smart structure model is
reduced and the parameters for actuator location are
obtained easily. Genetic algorithm is then applied to
search for the optimal solutions. Next, the adaptive
feedforward control is introduced into smart structure
vibration control. It stemmed from the adaptive signal
processing theory, and has been previously applied to
the cancellation of signals, the active control of acous-
tics, as well as structural vibration control of civil
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. NSERC Research
Fellow.
E-mail: Fujun.Peng@space.gc.ca
JOURNAL OF INTELLIGENT MATERIAL SYSTEMS AND STRUCTURES, Vol. 16March 2005 263
1045-389X/05/03 02639 $10.00/0 DOI: 10.1177/1045389X05050105
2005 Sage Publications
engineering structures, vehicles etc. (Peng et al., 2002).
Theoretically, zero error response can be achieved at
certain points using adaptive feedforward control if
certain conditions are satisfied (Smith, 1994). This is
quite attractive in smart structure vibration control.
Unlike most of the feedback control methods, the
adaptive feedforward control does not need the accurate
model of the controlled structure. This makes it very
robust to the modeling error of the dynamic properties
of flexible structures. Finally, numerical simulations are
conducted on reducing tri-sinusoidal response at three
points of the plate. The comparison of controlled and
uncontrolled responses shows that the control system
is efficient in minimizing the smart structure vibrations.
The controlled responses with and without actuator
location optimization are compared, and the result
indicates that the proposed actuator placement optimi-
zation method is effective in reducing power require-
ment and increasing control efficiency. In order to
evaluate control system robustness, stiffness uncertain-
ties are then intentionally added to the dynamic model
of the plate, while the control system parameters remain
unchanged. The simulation result shows that the control
system still works well with significant vibration
reduction, thus demonstrating the robustness of the
control system.
PERFORMANCE CRITERION DERIVATION
Location Optimization of Point Actuators
Consider a structure that is modeled using finite
element method as:
M

VV C
_
VV KV = F (1)
where, M, C, and K are mass matrix, damping matrix,
and stiffness matrix, respectively; F is a column vector
containing p point control forces acting at locations
P
j
( j =1, 2, . . . , p). This model can be written in modal
space as a set of ordinary differential equations:

i
2
i
!
i
_
i
!
2
i

i
=
X
p
j=1
U
i
(P
j
)f
j
, i = 1, 2, . . . , n, (2)
where, !
i
and
i
are the ith natural frequency and modal
damping ratio. U is mode shape matrix and U
i
is the ith
column of U. f
j
is the point force acting on point P
j
.
Defining the state (only first n modes are considered)
and input vectors as
X = [ _
1
, !
1

1
, . . . , _
n
, !
n

n
]
T
, U = [f
1
, . . . , f
p
]
T
, (3)
yields the state representation of the model,
_
XX = AX BU (4)
where,
A = diag(A
i
), A
i
=
2
i
!
i
!
i
!
i
0
" #
(5)
B =
U
1
(P
1
) U
1
(P
p
)
0 0
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
U
n
(P
1
) U
n
(P
p
)
0 0
2
6
6
6
6
4
3
7
7
7
7
5
(6)
Note the dependence of matrix B on the location of
point force actuators P
j
, j =1, . . . , p. If an actuator is
located at the nodal point of a mode, this mode becomes
uncontrollable through that actuator. Actuator location
in the vicinity of the node would require a large effort to
control this mode.
For a structure described by Equations (4)(6), Hac
and Liu (1993) suggested the following performance
index based on the maximization of the controllability
grammian
J =
X
2n
j=1

j
!

Y
2n
j=1
(
j
)
2n
r
(7)
where
j
is the jth eigenvalue of controllability gram-
mian, which can be written as:

2i1
=
2i
=
P
p
q=1
U
2
i
(P
q
)
4
i
!
i
(8)
This criterion guarantees a minimum control force and
energy and is applicable to both cases of persistent
or transient disturbance when the structure is lightly
damped and the natural frequencies of the structure are
well spaced.
Location Optimization of Piezoelectric Patches
Using finite element method, a flexible structure with
p piezo-patch actuators bonded on its surface (perfect
bond assumed) can be modeled as (Piefort, 2001):
M

VV C
_
VV K
VV
V = K
Vu
(9)
K
uV
V K
uu
u = F
u
(10)
where, V and u denote the mechanical nodal displace-
ments and the nodal electrical potentials, respectively;
M, C, and K
VV
are mass matrix, damping matrix, and
stiffness matrix, respectively; K
uu
is the piezoelectric
capacitance matrix; K
V/
= K
T
/V
is the electromechanical
coupling matrix; F

denotes the electrical charge vector.

The dynamic equation of the structure is only governed
by Equation (9), which can be written in modal space
similar to Equation (2)

i
2
i
!
i
_
i
!
2

i
= U
T
i
K
Vu
u, i = 1, 2, . . . , n (11)
264 F. PENG ET AL.
where, !
i
and
i
are the ith natural frequency and modal
damping ratio. U is the mode shape matrix.
In Equation (11), the nodal electrical potential u is a
vector of control variables. However, practically we
do not directly apply or control any nodal electrical
potential node by node. Instead, we exert voltages
to piezoelectric patches, each of which usually covers
multiple nodes. So we need express u using control
voltages.
Based on finite element model, the voltage applied to
a piezoelectric patch can be equivalently regarded as
electric potentials acting on every node. Thus, the nodal
electrical potential vector u and the applied voltage
vector w can be related by a matrix, written as K
uw
:
u - K
uw
w = K
uw
[w
1
, . . . , w
p
]
T
(12)
Denote
K
Vw
= K
Vu
K
uw
, Q
i
= U
T
i
K
Vw
(13)
Substitute Equations (12) and (13) into Equation (11),
we have

i
2
i
!
i
_
i
!
2
i

i
=
X
p
j=1
Q
i
( j)
j
, i = 1, 2, . . . , n (14)
Noting that Equation (14) has exactly the same form as
Equation (2), we can directly write the performance
index similar to Equations (7) and (8) as follows:
J =
X
2n
j=1

j
!

Y
2n
j=1
(
j
)
2n
r
(15)

2i1
=
2i
=
P
P
q=1
Q
2
i
(q)
4
i
!
i
(16)
where,
j
is the jth eigenvalue of controllability gram-
mian.
Determination of Parameters using ANSYS
In order to compute the performance index expressed
in Equations (15) and (16), we need to determine first
nth order modal parameters and variable Q
i
. Using
ANSYS, the modal parameters can be obtained directly.
Regarding the computation of Q
i
, it is obvious from
Equation (14) that Q
i
( j) has the similar physical meaning
to U
i
(P
j
) in Equation (2). The former corresponds to the
ith modal force generated by a unit voltage applied
at the piezoelectric patch put on the jth location, and
the latter is the ith modal force generated by a unit
point force applied at the jth location. Q
i
is determined
by Equation (13), in which, U
i
is the ith mode shape,
K
Vw
can be seen as a coupling matrix between the
applied voltage vector and equivalent nodal force
vector. U
i
is also available directly from ANSYS,
while K
Vw
can be obtained as follows: As an example,
let us consider a thin rectangular cantilever aluminum
plate (240 200 mm
2
), on which four piezoelectric
patches are to be bonded on 64 possible areas to control
its vibration. First, 64 pieces of piezoelectric patches
(29.5 24.5 mm
2
) are placed uniformly on one side of
the plate, and the smart structure is modeled using
ANSYS. The model is of FE form with very high order.
Next, Structuring Analysis is performed with 64 master
DOF, each corresponding to a central point on a
piezoelectric patch surface, (see Figure 1). Thus the
smart structure is treated as a superelement with 64
nodes and K
Vw
is a 64 64 matrix. The Structuring
Analysis process is repeated, each time with a unit
voltage applied on a single piezoelectric patch (the
voltage is applied only on one patch, others remain
free of voltage). In each Structuring Analysis, we get
an equivalent nodal force vector (64 1) S
1
, which
corresponds to the unit voltage applied. Finally, K
Vw
is
obtained as [S
1
S
2
S
r
S
64
]. This simple method
of determining K
Vw
is effective when the PZT patches
are very thin and light, and contribute only a little to
the structures mass and stiffness.
OPTIMIZATION IMPLEMENTATION USING
GENETIC ALGORITHM
Genetic Algorithm is a type of optimization searching
technique derived from the mechanics of natural selec-
tion and genetics. This mechanism has been mathe-
matically shown to eventually converge to the best
possible solution. Compared to the traditional search
and optimization procedures, Genetic Algorithm is
robust, and generally more straightforward to use. It is
stochastic in nature, thus is capable of searching the
entire solution space with more likelihood of finding the
global optimum. Genetic Algorithm is suitable to apply
in situations where only a little or no prior knowledge
Point 2
Point 1
Point 3
Figure 1. Actuator location arrangement and master DOF selection.
Optimization Vibration Control of Plate Smart Structures 265
is known, linear or nonlinear problems (Sadri et al.,
1999; Chambers, 2000).
To implement the actuator placement optimization,
all the parameters (location coordinates or location
number) to be optimized are first mapped (coded) into
a chromosome, each parameter corresponding to one
particular portion of the chromosome, and then the
following steps are performed to search for the best
solutions, see Figure 2:
1. [Initialization] Generate random population of n
individuals (suitable solutions for the problem)
2. [Fitness] Evaluate the fitness of each individual in the
population
3. [Criteria met?] Check if the end condition is satisfied,
if yes, stop and return the best solution, if not,
generate new population for a further run of
algorithm
4. [New population] Create a new population by repeat-
ing the following steps:
(1) [Selection] Select two parent individuals from a
population according to their fitness (the better
fitness, the bigger chance to be selected).
(2) [Crossover] With a crossover probability,
crossover the parents to form a new offspring. If no
crossover was performed, offspring is an exact copy of
parents.
(3) [Mutation] With a mutation probability, mutate
new offspring at each locus (position in individual).
(4) [Accepting] Place new offspring in a new
population.
5. [Loop] Go to step 2
After the best individuals are obtained, decode them
to the required parameters, and choose one as the
optimized solution.
ADAPTIVE FEEDFORWARD CONTROL
The basic idea of the adaptive feedforward control is
cancellation, i.e., the adaptive controller tries to adjust
its parameters in real time such that the vibration
response produced by the control forces tends to be the
same in magnitude as the original disturbance response
but with counter phase, and thus the disturbance
response is cancelled (Vipperman et al., 1993; Fuller
et al., 1997; Peng et al., 2002). The block diagram of
adaptive feedforward control is shown in Figure 3.
The filtered-x based algorithm can be expressed as
(Peng et al., 2002):
W(n 1) = W(n) 2R(n)e(n) (17)
where,
W(n) = w
1
(n)
T
w
2
(n)
T
w
M
(n)
T

T
(18)
w
m
(n) = [w
11
(n) w
12
(n) w
1I
(n)]
T
(19)
R(n) =
r
T
11
(n) r
T
21
(n) r
T
M1
(n)
r
T
12
(n) r
T
22
(n) r
T
M2
(n)
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
r
T
1L
(n) r
T
2L
(n) . . . r
T
ML
(n)
2
6
6
6
6
6
4
3
7
7
7
7
7
5
T
(20)
r
ml
(n) = [r
ml
(n) r
ml
(n 1) r
ml
(n I 1)]
T
(21)
r
ml
(n) = H
T
ml
X
Jm
(n) (22)
H =
H
11
H
12

H
m1
H
m2

H
M1
H
M2

H
1l
H
ml
H
Ml



H
1L
H
mL
H
ML
2
6
4
3
7
5 (23)
H
ml
= h
ml1
h
ml2
h
mlJ

T
(24)
X
Jm
(n) = x
m
(n)x
m
(n 1) x
m
(n J 1) [ ]
T
(25)
Then the control signal given by the mth controller can
be written as:
y
m
(n) = w
T
m
(n)X
Im
(n) (26)
X
Im
(n) = [x
m
(n) x
m
(n 1) x
m
(n I 1)]
T
(27)
It can be proved that the algorithm described by the
above is stable when the value of the convergence factor
Initial Population
New Population Selection
Mutation Crossover
Best Individuals
Fitness Evaluation Criteria Met ?
No
Yes
Parameter Coding Parameter Decoding
Figure 2. Block diagram of genetic algorithm.
External
Disturbances
Reference
Signals
X(n)
Y(n) e(n)
H
R(n)
Structure Controller
LMS
Figure 3. Block diagram of multichannel filtered -x LMS algorithm.
266 F. PENG ET AL.
is in the range of 0<<
max
, where
max
is the
maximum eigenvalue of the filtered autocorrelation
matrix, given by E[R(n)R
T
(n)]. In practice, the eigen-
values of this matrix are rarely known. A more restricted
and practical convergence criterion based on the
average input power can be (Vipperman et al., 1993):
0 < <
1
h
2
max
L M I J
2
R
xx
(0)
(28)
where, R
xx
(0) represents the maximum average power of
the M reference signals (there is an average power for
each reference signal, and the R
xx
(0) is the largest one),
and h
max
represents the largest value of h
mlj
. It can be
seen that the denominator of the upper limit for the
convergence factor is proportional to both the number
of error sensors, L, and the number of control actuators,
M, which means that the control system converges
slower with the increase of the number of error sensors
and control actuators.
During the adaptive control process, the estimated
gradient vector given by R(n)e(n) may not always
coincide with the steepest gradient in which the cost
function is reduced with the fastest speed. But the
controller will still converge toward its optimal value as
long as the estimated gradient vector has a component
toward this direction. This implies that an accurate
estimate of the FIR models is not required. For a single
channel control with a two-coefficient controller, for
example, this means that the estimated gradient will
reduce the cost function effectively if it is within 90

with respect to the steepest gradient vector. Thus, this

control approach is tolerant of error in the FIR model
estimation.
Before starting the control process, the FIR models
H
ml
of the control channel transfer properties need to be
obtained. This can be obtained by sampling the impulse
response (apply one impulse force at the mth actuator
and get samples at the lth sensor). But in most cases, it is
estimated by the adaptive identification technique.
NUMERICAL SIMULATIONS
The purpose of the simulations is to verify the
effectiveness of the proposed actuator placement opti-
mization and adaptive feedforward control algorithm
in smart structure vibration control. The structure to be
controlled is a 240 200 mm
2
thin rectangular aluminum
plate with cantilever boundary condition. Four piezo-
electric patches are optimally bonded on the surface (one
side) of the plate, and then tri-sinusoidal vibration
response is controlled using adaptive feedforward con-
trol. Using ANSYS, the structure (without actuator
bonded) is modeled and the first five modes are shown in
Figure 4. The parameters, Q
i
in Equation (14) and J in
Equation (15), etc., are obtained using the method
illustrated in previous sections.
In order to implement the optimization process,
number the 64 candidate locations from 0 to 63. A
chromosome is coded with 24 binary number, with each
6 consecutive bits corresponding to an actuator location
number from the first bit. With every individual
generated by Genetic Algorithm, decode and calculate
the corresponding performance index expressed by
Equation (15) until best individuals are found. First 5
modes of the plate are considered. Genetic Algorithm

1
=11.73 Hz

2
= 32.66 Hz

3
= 72.45 Hz

5
= 123.53Hz
4
= 114.80 Hz
Figure 4. First five mode shapes of the plate.
Optimization Vibration Control of Plate Smart Structures 267
parameters are set as: The number of individuals in a
population is 10; Maximal number of generation is 350;
Generation gap is 0.8, which means 8 new individuals
are created in the new population; Selection function
is Stochastic Universal Sampling; Crossover function is
Single-point Crossover; Mutation function is Discrete
Mutation Operator. Normally, Genetic Algorithm
suggests some best solutions only, instead of giving the
final decision directly. The final decision is still the
designers work. Here, the Genetic Algorithm optimiza-
tion is performed 10 times and the best 12 individuals
are listed in Table 1. Figure 5 shows a convergence
process of Genetic Algorithm.
In order to make a good decision of choosing the best
solutions, we calculated the effect of the 9 locations
appeared in the best 12 individuals on the first 5 modes.
The results are listed in the format of scores, which are
calculated as follows: The modal forces are calculated
(for all the first 5 modes) when applying a unit voltage
on the PZT patch bonded on these 64 locations, respec-
tively. The best location to a specific mode, which
corresponds to the largest modal force, is assigned
the highest ranking, no. 1, while the worst the lowest
ranking, no. 64. The score of a location with respect to
a specific mode is (64 ranking)/63 100. Thus the
best location is scored 100 and the worst 0 (see Table 2).
The final decision is that four piezoelectric patches
are bonded on locations 4, 8, 33, and 37, respectively.
Figure 6 shows the final decision. Such a decision
assures that all of the first 5 modes can be controlled
efficiently. Of course, this is not the only best choice in
all the cases. For example, if the vibration response to be
controlled is dominated by modes 2 and 3, the best
choice may be locations 2, 3, 4, and 8.
Using the actuators bonded on the optimized loca-
tions above, the vibration response at three points (see
Figure 1) of the plate is controlled by the adaptive
feedforward controller. First 5 modes of the plate are
considered in the dynamic model. The external dis-
turbances, which are tri-sinusoidal signals consisting of
18, 45, and 85 Hz, are applied to the plate by patches 3
and 16. Control parameters are selected as follows:
the reference signal is a tri-sinusoidal signal with the
same frequency components as the external disturbance;
the controller order and FIR model order are 8;
the sampling rate is 350 Hz; the convergence factor =
0.00003. The time histories and frequency spectrum
of controlled and uncontrolled responses are shown in
Figures 7 and 8. Figure 9 shows the control voltages at
the 4 actuators. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of
the proposed actuator placement optimization method,
4 12 20 28 36 44 52 60
3 11 19 27 35 43 51 59
2 10 18 26 34 42 50 58
1 9 17 25 33 41 49 57
5 13 21 29 37 45 53 61
6 14 22 30 38 46 54 62
7 15 23 31 39 47 55 63
8 16 24 32 40 48 56 64
Figure 6. The final optimized actuator locations.
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
0.5
1
1.5
2
2.5
x10
11
Iterations
P
e
r
f
o
r
m
a
n
c
e

i
n
d
e
x
Figure 5. A convergence process of GA optimization.
Table 1. The best 12 individuals obtained from GA.
Actuator Locations Performance Index Values
[2, 4, 8, 53] 2.005 e-11
[3, 4, 7, 61] 2.006 e-11
[4, 8, 37, 53] 2.010 e-11
[3, 4, 8, 34] 2.038 e-11
[2, 4, 8, 33] 2.088 e-11
[2, 4, 8, 41] 2.074 e-11
[4, 8, 33, 41] 2.086 e-11
[4, 8, 33, 37] 2.192 e-11
[3, 4, 8, 61] 2.255 e-11
[3, 4, 8, 53] 2.271 e-11
[3, 4, 8, 41] 2.344 e-11
[3, 4, 8, 33] 2.355 e-11
Table 2. Location scores with respect to first 5 modes.
Location 2 3 4 8 33 37 41 53 61
Mode 1 96.9 93.7 87.3 87.3 49.2 49.2 27.0 8.0 20.7
Mode 2 93.7 96.8 100 100 11.1 11.1 20.7 27.0 17.5
Mode 3 93.7 96.8 100 100 77.8 77.8 52.4 14.3 11.1
Mode 4 71.4 93.7 100 100 36.5 36.5 20.6 14.3 30.2
Mode 5 46.0 4.8 36.5 36.5 90.5 90.5 93.7 100 96.8
268 F. PENG ET AL.
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n

(
m
/
s
2
)
0 20 40 60 80 100
10
3
10
2
10
1
10
0
101
Without control
Control without optimization
Control with optimization
Frequency (Hz)
(a) Point 1
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n
(
m
/
s
2
)
0 20 40 60 80 100
10
2
10
2
10
1
10
2
10
2
10
1
10
0
10
1
Without control
Control without optimization
Control with optimization
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n
(
m
/
s
2
)
0 20 40 60 80 100
10
0
10
1
Without control
Control without optimization
Control with optimization
Frequency (Hz) requency (Hz)
(b) Point 2 (c) Point3 Figure 8. Frequency spectra of responses.
80 80.5 81
2
1
0
1
2
3
4
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n

(
m
/
s
2
)
Without control
Control without optimization
Control with optimization
Time (s)
(a) Point 1
80 80.5 81
2
1
0
1
2
3
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n

t
(
m
/
s
2
)
Without control
Control without optimization
Control with optimization
80 80.5 81
2
0
2
4
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n

(
m
/
s
2
)
Without control
Control without optimization
Control with optimization
Time (s) Time (s)
(b) Point 2 (c) Point 3 Figure 7. Controlled and uncontrolled responses.
Optimization Vibration Control of Plate Smart Structures 269
a simulation is also performed using 4 actuators put on
the other 4 locations (18, 22, 41, and 45) instead of the
optimized locations. The results are also shown in
Figures 79.
In order to evaluate the robustness of the controller,
stiffness uncertainties are intentionally added to the
model of the plate, but the FIR model and all the
control parameters remain the same as no uncertainty
exists. With the stiffness uncertainties, the first five
modal frequencies are reduced to 90% of the original.
The corresponding controlled and uncontrolled
responses are shown in Figure 10.
One can find from Figure 7 that vibration amplitudes
are significantly reduced at all the three points and
control efficiency using location-optimized actuators is
much higher than those using actuators without location
optimization. Figure 8 shows that all three sinusoids are
suppressed remarkably, and again location-optimized
actuators produce better results. Figure 9 indicates that
using location-optimized actuators, much less energy is
required while better results are achieved. These results
show that the proposed actuator placement method
reduces the control energy effectively and the adaptive
feedforward control works very efficiently in suppres-
sing the smart structure vibration response. Figure 10
shows that vibration reduction is still significant
when structure stiffness is intentionally added, thus
demonstrates the good robustness of the adaptive
feedforward control.
CONCLUSIONS
Smart materials and structures have great potential
advantages in a wide range of applications, such as
aeronautical and aerospace engineering, etc. In the field
of structural shape and vibration control, piezoelectric
materials received the most attention because of their
low mass, high bandwidth, low cost, etc. This paper
develops a methodology for piezoelectric patches place-
ment optimization and introduces adaptive feedforward
control into smart structure vibration control. The
opitimization methodology is based on modeling using
ANSYS and Substructuring Analysis, controllability
grammian maximization, and genetic algorithm imple-
mentation. Computer simulations are performed on
optimizing four piezoelectric patches on a thin rectan-
gular plate and controlling the vibration response at
three points on it. Results show that the proposed
actuator placement optimization method is effective in
reducing power requirement and increasing control
efficiency. The results also demonstrate that the
adaptive feedforward control is efficient in suppressing
vibration responses of the plate with good robustness.
80 80.5 81
300
0
300
600
V
o
l
t
a
g
e

(
V
)
Control voltage without optimization
Control voltage with optimization
80 80.5 81
300
0
300
600
V
o
l
t
a
g
e

(
V
)
Control voltage without optimization
Control voltage with optimization
Time (s) Time (s)
(a) Actuators 4 and 18 (b) Actuators 8 and 22
80 80.5 81
300
0
300
600
V
o
l
t
a
g
e

(
V
)
Control voltage without optimization
Control voltage with optimization
80 80.5 81
300
0
300
600
V
o
l
t
a
g
e

(
V
)
Control voltage without optimization
Control voltage with optimization
Time (s) Time (s)
(c) Actuators 33 and 41 (d) Actuators 37 and 45
Figure 9. Control voltages at the four
actuators.
270 F. PENG ET AL.
NOMENCLATURE
C= damping matrix
F= force vector
H= FIR model of structure
K= stiffness matrix
M= mass matrix
V= nodal displacement vector
W= controller vector
e = error response vector
f
j
= force applied at location j
x
m
= mth reference signal
U= mode shape matrix
!
i
= ith natural frequency of structure

i
= ith modal damping ratio of structure

i
= general coordinate

j
= jth eigenvalue of controllability grammian
u= nodal electrical potentials vector
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80 80.5 81
2
1
0
1
2
3
A
c
c
e
l
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a
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m
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s
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Without control
With control
Time (s)
(a) Point 1
80 80.5 81
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3
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
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n
(
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Without control
With control
80 80.5 81
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0
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4
A
c
c
e
l
e
r
a
t
i
o
n

(
m
/
s
2
)
Without control
With control
Time (s) Time (s)
(b) Point 2 (c) Point 3
Figure 10. Responses with stiffness
uncertainties considered.
Optimization Vibration Control of Plate Smart Structures 271