Feedback control of nonlinear PDEs using data-efficient reduced order models based on the Koopman operator

In the development of model predictive controllers for PDE-constrained problems, the use of reduced order models is essential to enable real-time applicability. Besides local linearization approaches, proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) has been most widely used in the past in order to derive such models. Due to the huge advances concerning both theory as well as the numerical approximation, a very promising alternative based on the Koopman operator has recently emerged. In this chapter, we present two control strategies for model predictive control of nonlinear PDEs using data-efficient approximations of the Koopman operator. In the first one, the dynamic control system is replaced by a small number of autonomous systems with different yet constant inputs. The control problem is consequently transformed into a switching problem. In the second approach, a bilinear surrogate model is obtained via a convex combination of these autonomous systems. Using a recent convergence result for extended dynamic mode decomposition (EDMD), convergence of the reduced objective function can be shown. We study the properties of these two strategies with respect to solution quality, data requirements, and complexity of the resulting optimization problem using the 1-dimensional Burgers equation and the 2-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations as examples. Finally, an extension for online adaptivity is presented.