VIBRATION SUPPRESSION USING CHAOTICALLY CONTROLLED ADAPTIVE STRUCTURES

The following proposal contains a design that significantly suppresses the vibration associated with space structures. Our intention is to develop a chaotically controlled suppression system utilizing electrorheological (ER) material based adaptive structures. ER material structures can suppress structural vibrations through three functional characteristics: variable structural damping, resonance circumvention, and modal shape control. Theological Systems will develop chaotic control methods to synergize the three functionalities into a single control system. Chaotic methods are chosen because of the inherent nonlinearities and complexities of controlling structural vibrations. The distinguishing features of chaos are unpredictable behavior where no relation between cause and effect seem to exist. Most structural vibration applications exhibit chaotic behavior. The concept of chaotic control is to bound a region embedded in the chaotic attractor through time dependent perturbations.