2.3 3.

Editorial

Special Issue on Algorithms for PID

Ramiro S. Barbosa and Isabel S. Jesus

Special Issue
Algorithms for PID Controller 2021
Edited by
Prof. Dr. Ramiro Barbosa and Prof. Dr. Isabel Jesus

https://doi.org/10.3390/a16010035
 algorithms
Editorial
Special Issue on Algorithms for PID Controllers 2021
Ramiro S. Barbosa * and Isabel S. Jesus

GECAD—Research Group on Intelligent Engineering and Computing for Advanced Innovation and Development,
Department of Electrical Engineering, Institute of Engineering—Polytechnic of Porto (ISEP/IPP), Rua Dr. António
Bernardino de Almeida, 431, 4249-015 Porto, Portugal
* Correspondence: [email protected]

1. Introduction
The PID is the most common type of algorithm used in control system applications. It is
widely used in industry, mainly because it is simple, easy to implement and gives satisfactory
results for most of the applications. Thus, despite being invented several decades ago, it is
still a useful and state-of-the-art algorithm when the feedback control of dynamic systems is
concerned. Several modifications have been proposed over time regarding its structure and
techniques applied to improve its performance and to keep it an up-to-date controller.
This Special Issue aimed to present the most recent developments in the theory and
applications of PID controllers. The focus was on reporting theoretical and applied research
results in control structures, optimization techniques, metaheuristic algorithms, tuning meth-
ods, digital implementations, and applications of the PID algorithm, among others, and in
the use of current techniques of artificial intelligence such as machine learning, deep learning,
and reinforcement learning.
The articles of this Special Issue provide some new results and represent a step towards
the development and application of PID controllers.

2. Special Issue
The Special Issue comprises six research articles that present some advances on the theory
and applications of PID controllers. The authors in paper [1] present an artificial eukaryotic
flagellum (AEF) swimming robot made up of IPMC segments for the study of planar wave
generation for robot propulsion via single and distributed actuation. A controller robust to
gain variations is tuned to control link deflection, regardless of link length, and enabling the
Citation: Barbosa, R.S.; Jesus, I.S. implementation of a distributed actuation with the same controller design. For that purpose,
Special Issue on Algorithms for PID two control strategies were proposed: a classical PID controller and a non-integer-order
Controllers 2021. Algorithms 2023, 16, integrator. This article provides a different perspective from those presented in other works,
35. https://doi.org/10.3390/ addressing the design of a small-scale swimming robot whose links are integrated into the
a16010035
same piece of material and can work as actuators or passive flexible links. In paper [2],
Received: 4 January 2023 the authors investigate the containment control problem of discrete-time, first-order, multi-
Accepted: 5 January 2023 agent systems composed of multiple leaders and followers by using a proportional-integral
Published: 6 January 2023 (PI) coordination control protocol. The proportional term ensures the realization of the
containment, and the integral term guarantees the rendezvous. It is proven that the proposed
protocol drives followers with unconnected topology to converge to the convex hull of the
leaders. In [3], the authors present a new coronavirus optimization algorithm (CVOA) to tune
Copyright: © 2023 by the authors. a PID controller to track a preselected reference speed of a brushless DC (BLDC) motor under
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
several types of disturbances. The algorithm simulates how the coronavirus (COVID-19)
This article is an open access article
spreads and infects healthy people. The advantage of CVOA is that its parameters can adapt
distributed under the terms and
according to disease statistics to prevent the need for trial and error that occurs when designers
conditions of the Creative Commons
initialize these parameters with arbitrary values. In addition, the algorithm has the ability to
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://
end after several iterations when the infected population cannot infect new individuals. The
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
results proved that the CVOA-based PID controller has the best performance among other
4.0/).

Algorithms 2023, 16, 35. https://doi.org/10.3390/a16010035 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/algorithms

techniques, such as the genetic algorithm (GA) and Harmony Search (HS) optimization. The
authors in [4] propose the parameter optimization of the flight control system of a single-rotor,
medium-scale rotorcraft. A six degrees-of-freedom (DOF) nonlinear mathematical model of a
rotorcraft and the design of a closed-loop flight control system for a rotorcraft based on six
concurrent PID controllers are developed. A comparative study of computational intelligence
optimization algorithms is also performed to find the best PID controller parameters for a
given flight regime. These techniques include particle swarm optimization (PSO), genetic
algorithm (GA), ant colony optimization (ACO), and cuckoo search (CS). It was observed
that the optimized PID controllers are effective around the trim point for which they were
developed, with ACO-PID performing better for hovering and GA-PID for forward flight.
However, the ACO-optimized controller can outperform the other optimization algorithms
both in holding the trim state and recovering from external disturbance. In [5], the authors
present an improved Quasi-Affine Transformation Evolutionary (QUATRE) algorithm for the
parameter tuning of PID controllers. The accuracy of the algorithm was improved by using an
adaptive mechanism adjusting control parameters online and a linear population reduction
strategy. The proposed algorithm is compared with the PSO and the standard QUATRE
algorithm. It was concluded that the new approach is better than PID parameter tuning using
PSO and the original QUATRE algorithm, showing less overshoot and a shorter rise time,
which makes the whole control system more stable, thus proving that the PID parameter
tuning method based on the improved QUATRE algorithm is more effective. The authors in [6]
use two different methodologies to investigate the use of the maximum power point tracking
(MPPT) technique in a photovoltaic (PV) system composed of five solar panels in series. The
first considered a traditional Perturb and Observe (P&O) algorithm, and the second applied a
Fuzzy Logic Controller (FLC) that uses fuzzy logic concepts to improve the traditional P&O.
Both methods were implemented in a boost converter. A study is performed to see if the
intelligent MPPT method can be more efficient, stable, and adaptable than a traditional MPPT
method in varying environment conditions, namely, solar irradiation and/or environmental
temperature and also to analyze their behavior in steady-state conditions. It was shown that
the proposed fuzzy logic enhanced P&O, which is a P&O algorithm improved with a fuzzy
logic algorithm, increases the performance of the P&O algorithm, enabling the system to adapt
faster to variable environmental conditions, leading to a faster MPP and an equal performance
in steady-state conditions when the MPP is reached, and thus to higher generated energy.

Acknowledgments: The guest editors would like to thank the authors and reviewers which con-
tributed to this Special Issue. A special thanks goes to Musea Wu and the staff at the Algorithms
Editorial Office for their assistance.
Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare no conflict of interest.

References
1. Traver, J.E.; Nuevo-Gallardo, C.; Rodríguez, P.; Tejado, I.; Vinagre, B.M. Modeling and Control of IPMC-Based Artificial Eukaryotic
Flagellum Swimming Robot: Distributed Actuation. Algorithms 2022, 15, 181. [CrossRef]
2. Huang, M.; Liu, C.; Shan, L. Containment Control of First-Order Multi-Agent Systems under PI Coordination Protocol. Algorithms
2021, 14, 209. [CrossRef]
3. Shamseldin, M.A. Optimal Coronavirus Optimization Algorithm Based PID Controller for High Performance Brushless DC
Motor. Algorithms 2021, 14, 193. [CrossRef]
4. Mpanza, L.J.; Pedro, J.O. Optimised Tuning of a PID-Based Flight Controller for a Medium-Scale Rotorcraft. Algorithms 2021, 14, 178.
[CrossRef]
5. Zhao, Z.Q.; Liu, S.J.; Pan, J.S. A PID Parameter Tuning Method Based on the Improved QUATRE Algorithm. Algorithms 2021, 14, 173.
[CrossRef]
6. Remoaldo, D.; Jesus, I. Analysis of a Traditional and a Fuzzy Logic Enhanced Perturb and Observe Algorithm for the MPPT of a
Photovoltaic System. Algorithms 2021, 14, 24. [CrossRef]

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