A Forward Reachability Perspective on Control Barrier Functions and Discount Factors in Reachability Analysis

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Choi, Jason J., Lee, Donggun, Li, Boyang, How, Jonathan P., Sreenath, Koushil, Herbert, Sylvia L., Tomlin, Claire J.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2023
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author Choi, Jason J.
Lee, Donggun
Li, Boyang
How, Jonathan P.
Sreenath, Koushil
Herbert, Sylvia L.
Tomlin, Claire J.
author_facet Choi, Jason J.
Lee, Donggun
Li, Boyang
How, Jonathan P.
Sreenath, Koushil
Herbert, Sylvia L.
Tomlin, Claire J.
contents Control invariant sets are crucial for various methods that aim to design safe control policies for systems whose state constraints must be satisfied over an indefinite time horizon. In this article, we explore the connections among reachability, control invariance, and Control Barrier Functions (CBFs). Unlike prior formulations based on backward reachability concepts, we establish a strong link between these three concepts by examining the inevitable Forward Reachable Tube (FRT), which is the set of states such that every trajectory reaching the FRT must have passed through a given initial set of states. First, our findings show that the inevitable FRT is a robust control invariant set if it has a continuously differentiable boundary. If the boundary is not differentiable, the FRT may lose invariance. We also show that any robust control invariant set including the initial set is a superset of the FRT if the boundary of the invariant set is differentiable. Next, we formulate a differential game between the control and disturbance, where the inevitable FRT is characterized by the zero-superlevel set of the value function. By incorporating a discount factor in the cost function of the game, the barrier constraint of the CBF naturally arises in the Hamilton-Jacobi (HJ) equation and determines the optimal policy. The resulting FRT value function serves as a CBF-like function, and conversely, any valid CBF is also a forward reachability value function. We further prove that any $C^1$ supersolution of the HJ equation for the FRT value functions is a valid CBF and characterizes a robust control invariant set that outer-approximates the FRT. Building on this property, finally, we devise a novel method that learns neural control barrier functions, which learn an control invariant superset of the FRT of a given initial set.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2310_17180
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A Forward Reachability Perspective on Control Barrier Functions and Discount Factors in Reachability Analysis
Choi, Jason J.
Lee, Donggun
Li, Boyang
How, Jonathan P.
Sreenath, Koushil
Herbert, Sylvia L.
Tomlin, Claire J.
Systems and Control
Control invariant sets are crucial for various methods that aim to design safe control policies for systems whose state constraints must be satisfied over an indefinite time horizon. In this article, we explore the connections among reachability, control invariance, and Control Barrier Functions (CBFs). Unlike prior formulations based on backward reachability concepts, we establish a strong link between these three concepts by examining the inevitable Forward Reachable Tube (FRT), which is the set of states such that every trajectory reaching the FRT must have passed through a given initial set of states. First, our findings show that the inevitable FRT is a robust control invariant set if it has a continuously differentiable boundary. If the boundary is not differentiable, the FRT may lose invariance. We also show that any robust control invariant set including the initial set is a superset of the FRT if the boundary of the invariant set is differentiable. Next, we formulate a differential game between the control and disturbance, where the inevitable FRT is characterized by the zero-superlevel set of the value function. By incorporating a discount factor in the cost function of the game, the barrier constraint of the CBF naturally arises in the Hamilton-Jacobi (HJ) equation and determines the optimal policy. The resulting FRT value function serves as a CBF-like function, and conversely, any valid CBF is also a forward reachability value function. We further prove that any $C^1$ supersolution of the HJ equation for the FRT value functions is a valid CBF and characterizes a robust control invariant set that outer-approximates the FRT. Building on this property, finally, we devise a novel method that learns neural control barrier functions, which learn an control invariant superset of the FRT of a given initial set.
title A Forward Reachability Perspective on Control Barrier Functions and Discount Factors in Reachability Analysis
topic Systems and Control
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2310.17180