Advanced safety filter based on SOS Control Barrier and Lyapunov Functions

Abstract

This paper presents a novel safety filter framework that ensures both safety and the preservation of the legacy control action within a nominal region. This modular design allows the safety filter to be integrated into the control hierarchy without compromising the performance of the existing legacy controller during nominal operation. For a control-affine system, this is accomplished by formulating multiple Control Barrier Functions (CBFs) and Control Lyapunov-like Functions (CLFs) conditions, alongside a forward invariance condition for the legacy controller, as sum-of-squares constraints. Additionally, the state-dependent inequality constraints of the resulting Quadratic Program (QP) - encoding the CBF and CLF conditions – are designed to remain inactive within the nominal region, ensuring preservation of the legacy control action and performance. To avoid the chattering effect and guarantee the uniqueness and Lipschitz continuity of solutions, the state-dependent inequality constraints of the QP are selected to be regular. Finally, we demonstrate the method in a detailed case study involving the control of a three-phase ac/dc power converter.