Nonlinearity estimator-based control of a class of uncertain nonlinear systems

The robust control problem of a class of nonlinear systems subject to external disturbances, control gain uncertainty and nonlinear uncertainties is investigated in this paper using a nonlinearity estimator-based control approach. Different from the existing results, the crucial but highly restrictive hypothesis on the boundedness of nonlinear uncertainties is removed from this paper by means of the tools of semi-global stabilization. By delicately constructing a specific composite Lyapunov function for the closed-loop system as well as several useful level sets, the rigorous qualitative robustness performance is presented for the closed-loop system. Finally, an example of a singlelink manipulator is utilized to demonstrate the performance specification claimed by the theoretical analysis.