CONFERENCE REPORTS
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2010 IEEE Conference on Decision and Control
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he 49th IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (CDC) was held at the Hilton Atlanta, Georgia, from Wednesday, December 15 through Friday, December 17, 2010, with preconference workshops on Tuesday, December 14th. The CDC was sponsored by the IEEE Control Systems Society (CSS) with technical cosponsorship from the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), the Institute for Operations Research and Management Sciences (ORMS), the Japanese Society for In-
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MCS.2011.940737 Date of publication: 16 May 2011
strument and Control (SICE), and the European Union Control Association (EUCA). The conference also received generous financial support from the U.S. National Science Foundation, Honeywell, the Mathworks, United Technologies, and the European Embedded Control Institute (EECI). Despite the record cold weather in Atlanta during the week of the conference, the warm southern hospitality of the hotel and of the city provided an excellent atmosphere for CDC attendees and their families. The ease of access and affordability of Atlanta contributed to a record attendance for a U.S. CDC and a high-quality technical program.
CONFERENCE HIGHLIGHTS Registration and Technical Program The 2010 CDC received an impressive 2060 regular and invited paper submissions. The CSS Conference Editorial Board (CEB) generated 5879 reviews for these papers, an average of 2.85 reviews per paper. Based on these reviews, 1280 papers were accepted for presentation at the conference, leading to an acceptance rate of 62%. There were 312 papers, or 24% of the accepted papers, scheduled in the interactive sessions held on Thursday, December 16, with the
(From left) Oscar Gonzales, Sam Ge, and Gary Balas.
(From left) Andy Teel and Christos Cassandras.
CSS President Roberto Tempo (right) passes the gavel to the incoming president Rick Middleton.
Steve Marcus and Francesco Bullo. JUNE 2011
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rest of the papers scheduled in oral presentation sessions. The technical program included a total of 23 interactive sessions, 44 invited sessions, 118 contributed sessions, and three tutorial sessions. The CDC continued its tradition of having strong international presence. Paper authorship by IEEE regions was 36.9% from Region 1–6 (United States), 3.4% from Region 7 (Canada), 41.4% from Region 8 (Europe, Middle East, and Africa), 4.4% from Region 9 (Latin America), and 13.9% from Region 10 (Asia and Pacific). Conference advance and onsite registration exceeded 1400, making the 2010 CDC one of the largest U.S. CDCs on record. Both the student travel support and support for developing countries contributed to the success of the CDC. Nearly 500 students attended the conference, which bodes well for the future of the CSS. Kishan Baheti provided US$10,000 for student travel support from his program at the National Science Foundation, which allowed us to provide registration
and three hotel nights to 26 students. An additional 14 students received identical support from the CSS Student Travel Support Program. Nine people, three of whom were students, received travel support from the CSS Support for Developing Countries Program. The supported applicants were from Russian, Ukraine, Turkey, South Korea, Serbia, Brazil, and India. In addition, the 2010 CDC continued the practice of giving free workshop registration to students.
PRECONFERENCE WORKSHOP AND EDUCATION WORKSHOP The preconference workshops were well attended with over 175 registrants, including 50 students, in eight full-day workshops. These were » Adaptive Networks and BioInspired Cognition, organized by Ali H. Sayed (University of California, Los Angeles, United States) » Correct-by-Design Embedded Control Software Synthesis, organized by Antoine Girard
After the awards ceremony, Christos Cassandras, Ted Djaferis, Pradeep Misra, Panos Antsaklis, and Kostas Kyriakopoulos.
CDC General Chair Mark Spong welcomes the participants. 74 IEEE CONTROL SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
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The Georgia Tech student volunteers with Fumin Zhang and Eyad Abed.
Ed Chong extended an invitation to the 2011 CDC in Orlando. JUNE 2011
(Universite Joseph Fourier, France), Giordano Pola (University of l’Aquila, Italy), and Paulo Tabuada (University of California, Los Angeles, United States) » Verification of Control Systems, organized by Ufuk Topcu (California Institute of Technology, United States) and Bruce H. Krogh (Carnegie Mellon University, United States) » Smart Grids: New Challenges for Control Systems Society, organized by Nader Motee (California Institute of Technology, United States), Steven Low (California Institute of Technology, United States), and Radhakisan S. Baheti (National Science Foundation, United States) » The Second Workshop on Formal Methods for Aerospace, organized by Manuela L. Bujorianu (University of Manchester, United Kingdom), Michael Fisher (University of Liverpool, United Kingdom), and Maria Prandini (Politecnico di Milano, Italy)
CSS members enjoying the banquet.
The CSS banquet.
» Applied Fractional Calculus in Controls and Signal Processing, organized by YangQuan Chen (Utah State University, United States) » Codesign of Control and RealTime Computing: Perspectives, Techniques, and Research Directions, organized by Vijay Gupta (University of Notre Dame, United States) and Paulo Tabuada (University of California, Los Angeles, United States). In addition to these regular workshops, two special workshops were organized. These were » Half-Century’s Excellence in Systems and Control Engineering—A Workshop Dedicated to Brian D.O. Anderson’s 70th Birthday, organized by Arvin Dehghani (Australian National University, Australia) and Changbin (Brad) Yu (Australian National University, Australia) » Preconference Workshop for High School Students and Teachers, in Celebration of the 10th Anniversary of the CSS and American Automatic Control Council (AACC) Outreach Program, organized by Bozenna Pasik-Duncan (University of Kansas, United States, and chair of CSS and AACC Technical Committees on Control Education) and coorganized by Bonnie Ferri (Georgia Tech, United States) with the financial sup-
The President’s and General Chair’s Reception was held at the Georgia Aquarium.
port of the CSS, AACC, the University of Kansas, and Georgia Tech. Additional special sessions organized and held during the conference were » Special Education Session: Preparing Tomorrow’s Scientists and Engineers for the Challenges of the 21st Century, organized by Bozenna Pasik-Duncan (University of Kansas and chair of CSS and AACC Technical Committees on Control Education) and sponsored by the CSS, AACC, and University of Kansas » Honeywell Session: Optimization and Control for the Smart Grid: Selected Applications and Challenges, organized by Tariq Samad (Honeywell) » MathWorks Technical Session: Teaching Control Systems to Future Engineers: How to Leverage Interactive Educational Tools, organized by Pascal Gahinet (Mathworks) Finally, two other special events rounded out the technical portion of the CDC. These were » Panel Discussion on E-Print Servers and Traditional Publishing, organized by John Baillieul (Boston University) and Roberto Tempo (Politecnico di Torino) » “Women in Control” Luncheon, the semi-annual meeting of the IEEE CSS Standing Committee on Women in Control.
EXHIBITS Eleven exhibitors participated in the 2010 CDC. Honeywell and the Mathworks were gold sponsors, United Technologies Research Center (UTRC) was a silver sponsor, and Quanser, Pendcon, Taylor & Francis, dSpace, National Instruments, SIAM, Springer, and Wolfram Research were regular exhibitors. To increase traffic through the exhibits area, the conference provided coffee breaks and other refreshments throughout the day as well as a cybercafé sponsored by the EECI in the exhibits area.
PLENARY AND SEMIPLENARY LECTURES We were honored to have an excellent set of plenary and semiplenary lectures by leading members of CSS. These were “Tall Transfer Functions, Singular Spectra, and Econometric Modeling” by Brian Anderson, Australian National University; “Randomization in Systems and Control: a Change of Perspective” by Marco Campi, University of Brescia, Italy; “Why Should I Care About Stochastic Hybrid Systems?,” by Joao Hespanha, University of California at Santa Barbara; and “Switched Systems with Positivity Constraints: Theory, Applications and Open Problems” by Elena Valcher, University of Padua, Italy. In addition, the Bode lecture was given by Manfred Morari of the ETH, Zurich, and was titled “The Role of JUNE 2011
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Theory in Control Practice.” All plenary and semiplenary sessions were well attended and well received. Continuing a tradition begun several years ago, these lectures were recorded and will be available in the CSS archives.
AWARDS CEREMONY AND BANQUET The annual CSS Awards Ceremony was held on Thursday, December 16, prior to the conference banquet. Over 400 people attended the awards ceremony and nearly 1200 people attended the banquet. The CSS awards were presented by members of the CSS Executive Committee. The IEEE was represented by the Division X Director Vicente Piuri, who presented the IEEE-level awards.
CSS Awards The 2010 Outstanding Chapter Award went to the Montreal Section CSS Chapter, chaired by Kaveh Moezzi, for recognizing its constant effort in promoting high-quality technical meetings and for dissemination to a large audience. The 2010 Distinguished Member Award was presented to Edwin Chong of Colorado State University for scientific contributions in the area of control, optimization, and modeling, with applications to computer and communication networks, sensor networks, and wireless systems, and outstanding service to the CSS through editorial and conferencerelated activities. This year there were four finalists for the CDC Best Student Paper. These were Behrouz Touri, Masahiro Ono, Pulkit Grover, and Sebastien Blandin. The award was presented to Pulkit Grover for the paper, “Is Witsenhausen’s Counterexample a Relevant Toy?” coauthored with his advisor Anant Sahai. The three CSS Outstanding Paper Awards were » The IEEE Control Systems Magazine Outstanding Paper Award to Rafael Goebel, Ricardo G. Sanfelice, and Andrew R. Teel 76 IEEE CONTROL SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
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Ann Rundell.
for their article “Hybrid Dynamical Systems,” IEEE Control Systems Magazine, April 2009, pp. 28–93. » The IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology Outstanding Paper Award to ChengLun Chen and George T.-C. Chiu for their paper “Banding Artifact Reduction for a Class of Color Electrophotographic Printers With Underactuated Motor/Gear Configuration,” IEEE Transactions on Control System Technology, vol. 16, no. 4, July 2008, pp. 577–588. » The George S. Axelby Outstanding Paper Award to Nuno C. Martins and Munther A. Dahleh for their paper “Feedback Control in the Presence of Noisy Channels: ‘Bode-Like’ Fundamental Limitations of Performance,” IEEE Transactions on Automatic Control, vol. 53, no. 7, July 2008, pp. 1604–1615. The 2010 Control Systems Technology Award was given to Mrdjan Jankovic of Ford Motor Company for “advancing automotive engine tech-
The 2010 award winners.
nology using novel control and optimization methods.” The 2010 Transition to Practice Award was given to Markos Papageorgiou, and Ioannis Papamichail “for the development and implementation of ramp metering algorithms, in particular at the Monash Freeway, Melbourne, Australia.” The Transition to Practice Award comes with an invitation to deliver a plenary lecture at the 2011 IEEE Multiconference on Systems and Control, one of the two annual CSS conferences. The 2010 Antonio Ruberti Young Researcher Prize, which recognizes distinguished cutting-edge contributions by a young researcher to the theory or application of systems and control, was given to George J. Pappas “for fundamental contributions to embedded, hybrid, and networked control systems.” Finally, the 2010 Hendrik W. Bode Lecture Prize went to Manfred Morari, head of the Department of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering at ETH.
IEEE Awards The IEEE-level awards presented at the 2010 CDC were the Control Systems Award and IEEE Fellow awards. The Control Systems Award was presented to Graham C. Goodwin who was recognized “for contributions to the theory and practice of digital and adaptive control.” The 2010 recipients of the IEEE Fellow award, who were evaluated by the CSS, were Alberto Bemporad, Francesco Bullo, Raffaello D’Andrea,
Outstanding Chapter Award presented to (right) Kaveh Moezzi by Shinji Hara.
The Distinguished Member Award presented to (right) Edwin Chong by Shinji Hara.
The Student Best Paper Award presented to (left) Pulkit Grover by Elena Valcher.
The IEEE Control Systems Magazine Award presented to Rafael Goebel, Ricardo G. Sanfelice, and Andrew R. Teel by (left) Christos Cassandras.
The IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology Outstanding Paper Award presented to Cheng-Lun Chen and George T.-C. Chiu by (left) Christos Cassandras.
The George Axelby Outstanding Paper Award presented to Nuno C. Martins and Munther A. Dahleh by (left) Christos Cassandras.
Control Technology Award presented to (right) Mrdjan Jankovic by Sam Ge.
The Antonio Ruberti Young Investigator Prize presented to (right) George Pappas by Roberto Tempo.
The CSS Bode Prize presented to (right) Manfred Morari by Tariq Samad. JUNE 2011
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Guoxiang Gu, Ronald Patton, Zhihua Qu, Rodolphe Sepulchre, Mark Shayman, Changyun Wen, and Xiaohua Xia. In addition, the following CSS members were elected IEEE Fellows but evaluated by other Societies as indicated in parentheses: Eitan Altman (Communications), Maria Valla (Indistrial Electronics), Umit Ozguner (Inofrmation Thoeory), Hiroyuki Hama (Power & Energy), Stefano Chiaverini (Robotics and Automation), and Ian Ferguson (Sensors).
Graham Goodwin delivering remarks upon receiving the Control Systems Award.
THE ORGANIZING COMMITTEE I want to especially thank the members of the 2010 CDC Organizing Committee without whose dedication and hard work the 2010 CDC would not have been possible. Fathi Ghorbel served as program chair and put together the Technical Program Committee. LK Mestha (Publications chair), Warren Dixon (Finance chair), Jorge Cortes (Workshop chair), Magnus Egerstedt (vice chair for Invited Sessions), Gang-
IEEE Control Systems Award presented to (left) Graham Goodwin by Vicente Piuri.
bing Song (vice chair for Interactive and Tutorial Sessions), Kristi Morgansen (Student Activities chair), Fumin Zhang, (Local Arrangements chair), Marcie O’Malley (Publicity chair), Ann Rundell (Registration chair), and Bonnie Ferrie (Exhibits chair) all worked tirelessly to make the CDC a success. I would also like to thank Sandra Hirche and Shinji Hara for their assistance with the travel support programs. Alessandro Astolfi, the CEB chair, and the entire CEB deserve special thanks for providing the large number of reviews of the technical papers. And, of course, Pradeep Misra and Paperplaza continue to provide outstanding and tireless support. Finally, I would like to recognize Pam Halverson from Georgia Tech for her help at the registration desk and the many student volunteers who made sure that the sessions ran smoothly. This was truly a great team effort. Mark W. Spong 2010 CDC General Chair
Control, Optimization, and Functional Analysis: Synergies and Perspectives A WORKSHOP IN HONOR OF J. WILLIAM HELTON
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ill Helton has been pillar of systems theory for many years. So it comes as a surprise that he has a numerical age and, further, given his perpetual enthusiasm, engagement, and good humor, that it increments at the same rate as for the rest of us. (Bill claims to have a proof of this.) On October 2–4, 2010, a workshop sponsored by the National Science Foundation was held to celebrate the accomplishments of Bill Helton in his 65th year. The workshop focused on topics that constitute Bill’s research Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MCS.2011.940738
Date of publication: 16 May 2011
78 IEEE CONTROL SYSTEMS MAGAZINE
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Bill Helton.
legacy—H-infinity synthesis theory for linear and nonlinear systems, linear matrix inequalities, operator model theory, noncommutative geometry, noncommutative computer algebra,
and spectral representations of operators. The workshop was hosted by the Cymer Center for Control Systems and Dynamics and the Department of Mathematics at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), with generous help provided by Bill’s wife, Ruth Williams of the Mathematics Department at UCSD. Bill was born in November 1944 in Jacksonville, Texas. His father was an oral surgeon in the U.S. Army and later in private practice. His mother was a drama major at Northwestern University and worked in her husband’s oral surgery practice. Bill finished high school at Alamo Heights, Texas, at the age of 16. He received his
