May 08, 2026, Webb Hall 1100

I went to a fight last night and an adaptive control session broke out!” was a familiar quip during the early 1980s as turf battles about adaptive control theory raged. Yet, for all the effort and anguish, there are billions of instances of only a very few adaptive control systems working in the commercial world. These are chiefly in telecommunications in mobile power control, mobile adaptive equalization and, depending on your definition of “adaptive,” computer traffic control such as TCP/IP. The reason is that using data to adjust controllers, either indirectly using models or directly, places requirements on the data’s fitness for purpose and ensuring this requires: experiment design, assured prior knowledge and an appetite for failure. This talk will focus on the data requirements of controller design and at what cost to control performance this comes in practice. The content will blend centuries-old philosophical discussion of purely inductive methods and, by association, the role of (purely deductive) control theory and the eminent human control designer. Commercially successful examples will guide the assessment. The overall aim will be to rationalize the consideration and expectations of data-driven methods, so that we all are not sent back to the 1980s to relive that period and can safely attend fights.

Bob Bitmead is Distinguished Professor Emeritus in Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering at the University of California, San Diego. He holds degrees in Applied Mathematics and Electrical Engineering from Sydney University and Newcastle University, both in Australia. He has held faculty positions at the Australian National University and James Cook University of North Queensland. He is a control theorist with a long experience in control applications in many industrial sectors. His theoretical work is strongly informed and guided by these applications. He received the 2014 ASME Rufus Oldenburger Medal and the 2015 IEEE Controls Systems Transition to Practice Award. Bob was President of the IEEE Control Systems Society in 2019. He is Fellow of IEEE, IFAC and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering. Bob brewed his own beer and was an accredited and active Australian Rules Football umpire training with the San Diego Lions Australian Football Club. He retired from UCSD and football in 2024 and was forced from brewing during COVID-19 because of the reduced conviviality of those times; three tragedies.