Lino Guzzella

Automotive Systems - An Automatic Control Bonanza

Professor Dr. Lino Guzzella

ETH, Zurich
Switzerland

Individual mobility is closely linked to the welfare of any society. Not surprisingly, the number of automobiles has been inexorably increasing and is likely to double in the next twenty years. Clearly, this development creates many benefits and economic opportunities, but also many problems, such as air pollution, traffic fatalities, increased energy consumption and carbon dioxide emission.

In this talk the relevance of these problems will be prioritized and some of the most likely technological solutions will be presented. The key point is that in most - if not all - of these approaches automatic control systems will be an enabling factor, without which no true breakthroughs are possible.

After these rather general remarks, the following three examples will be presented to show what typical problem setups are to be faced and what methods are to be used to tackle these problems:

1. Emission-controlled diesel engines, which hold the promise of simultaneously reducing pollutant emissions, fuel consumption, and cost;

2. Pneumatic-hybrid gasoline engines, which may be a path to low-cost hybrid power trains;

3. Safe and fuel-efficient operation of lightweight vehicles using extensive communication and control systems.

The talk closes with some remarks concerning some possible consequences for the control community. It postulates that there is a demand for more powerful modeling methods and tools, for learning control systems, and for a better integration of feedback and feedforward control loops into communication and computation networks. The most important challenge, however, is finding a way to implement all of these new devices and still not increase the system costs.

Lino Guzzella

Lino Guzzella has been a full professor at ETH Zurich, Switzerland since 1999. After receiving his mechanical engineering diploma in 1981 and his doctoral degree in 1986, both from ETH, he has held several positions in industry and academia.

With his research group he focuses on novel approaches in system dynamics and in the control of energy conversion systems. Control-oriented systems modeling, dynamic optimization, and feedback control design methods are his main areas of research. He places a particular emphasis on the minimization of fuel consumption and pollutant emission of automotive propulsion systems. In teaching, he has been successfully promoting project- and team-based learning approaches.

Among the awards he received are the IEEE Control Systems Magazine Outstanding Paper Award, the SAE Arch T. Colwell Merit Award and the Ralph R. Teetor Educational Award, the IMechE Thomas Hawksley Medal and Crompton Lancaster Medal, and the Energy Globe Award.

Lino Guzzella has published more than 100 research articles as well as two textbooks (Modeling and Control of IC Engine Systems, Springer Verlag, 2004, and Vehicle Propulsion Systems, 2nd Ed., Springer Verlag, 2007). He is a consultant to several tier-one automotive companies and holds several patents on automotive control systems.