A general result in stochastic optimal control of nonlinear discrete-time systems with quadratic performance criteria

It is known that the optimal controller for a linear dynamic system disturbed by additive, independently distributed in time, not necessarily Gaussian, noise is a linear function of the state variables if the performance criterion is the expected value of a quadratic form. This result is known to hold also when the noise is Gaussian and is multiplied by a linear function of the state and/or control variables.In this paper it is proved that the optimal controller for a discrete-time linear dynamic system with quadratic performance criterion is a linear function of the state variables when the additive random vector is a nonlinear function of the state and/or control variables and not necessarily Gaussian noise which is independently distributed in time, provided only that the mean value of the random vector is zero (there is no loss of generality in assuming this) and the covariance matrix of the random vector is a quadratic function of the state and/or control variables. The above-mentioned known results emerge as special cases and certain nonlinear other special cases are exhibited.