Global asymptotic stability of oscillations with sliding modes

This paper explores a new methodology based on quadratic surface Lyapunov functions to globally analyze oscillations with sliding modes in relay feedback systems (RFS). The method consists in efficiently construct quadratic Lyapunov functions on switching surfaces that can be used to show that impact maps, i.e., maps from one switch to the next, are contracting. This, in turn, shows that the system is globally stable. Several classes of piecewise linear systems (PLS) were previously successfully analyzed with this methodology. In this paper, we consider PLS whose trajectories switch between subsystems of different dimensions. We present and discuss distinct relaxations leading to sufficient conditions of different conservatism and computationally complexity. The results in this paper open the door to the analysis of other, more complex classes of PLS.