A Survey of Modeling and Control Issues for Piezo-electric Actuators

Piezo-electric actuators (PEAs) have been widely used in nanopositioning applications due to their high stiffness, fast responses, and large actuating forces. However, the existence of nonlinearities such as hysteresis can greatly deteriorate their performance and, as such, modeling and control of PEAs for improved performance has drawn considerable attention in the literature. This paper presents a brief survey of recent achievements in modeling and control of PEAs as well as the relevant issues that remain to be resolved. Specifically, various methods for modeling hysteresis, creep, and vibration dynamics in PEAs are examined, followed by a discussion of the issues leading to modeling errors. Recently reported PEA control schemes are surveyed along with their advantages and disadvantages. The challenges associated with control problems are also discussed.