Minimal eventually positive realizations of externally positive systems

• It is a well-known fact that externally positive linear systems may fail to have a minimal positive realization. In order to investigate these cases, we introduce the notion of minimal eventually positive realization, for which the state update matrix becomes positive after a certain power. Eventually positive realizations capture the idea that in the impulse response of an externally positive system the state of a minimal realization may fail to be positive, but only transiently. As a consequence, we show that in discrete-time it is possible to use downsampling to obtain minimal positive realizations matching decimated sequences of Markov coefficients of the impulse response. In continuous-time, instead, if the sampling time is chosen sufficiently long, a minimal eventually positive realization leads always to a sampled realization which is minimal and positive.

Subject headings

TEKNIK OCH TEKNOLOGIER  -- Elektroteknik och elektronik -- Reglerteknik (hsv//swe)

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY  -- Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering -- Control Engineering (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Positive linear systems;Minimal realization;Eventually positive matrices;Perron–Frobenius theorem

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)