Global control of nonlinear systems with uncertain output function using homogeneous domination approach

SUMMARY This paper addresses the problem of using output feedback to globally control a class of nonlinear systems whose output functions are not precisely known. First, for the nominal linear system, we design a homogeneous state compensator without requiring precise information of the output function, and construct a nonlinear stabilizer with adjustable coefficients by using the generalized adding a power integrator technique. Then based on the homogeneous domination approach, a scaling gain is introduced into the proposed output feedback controller, which can be used by tuning the scaling gain to solve: (i) the problem of global output feedback stabilization for a class of upper‐triangular systems; and (ii) the problem of global practical output tracking for a class of lower‐triangular systems. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.