Controllability and observability of coordinated linear systems

This paper develops concepts of controllability and observability for the class of coordinated linear systems, a special class of linear hierarchical systems with a top-to-bottom information structure. The usual concepts of reachability and indistinguishability for linear systems are refined, taking into account the decentralized nature of coordinated linear systems. The corresponding controllability and observability decompositions are derived, and several concepts of controllability and observability for coordinated linear systems are introduced and discussed. These results are then combined to a definition and characterization of stabilizability via dynamic measurement feedback for this class of systems.