Treffer: The combinatorics of nonlinear controllability and noncommuting flows

These notes accompany four lectures, giving an introduction to new developments in, and tools for problems in nonlinear control. Roughly speaking, after the successful development, starting in the 1960s, of methods from linear algebra, complex analysis and functional analysis for solving linear control problems, the 1970s and 1980s saw the emergence of differential geometric tools that were to mimic that success for nonlinear systems. In the past 30 years this theory has matured, and now connects with many other branches of mathematics. The focus of these notes is the role of algebraic combinatorics for both illuminating structures and providing computational tools for nonlinear systems. On the control side, we focus on problems connected with controllability, although the combinatorial tools obviously have just as much use for other control problems, including e.g. pathplanning, realization theory, and observability.