Control-Oriented Modeling and Model-Based Estimation and Control for Diesel Engine Aftertreatment Systems

This article provides an overview of control-oriented modeling and model-based estimation and control for diesel engine aftertreatment systems. The chemical reactions and physical processes that occur in diesel engine after-treatment systems are quite complex. Computational models describing the chemical reaction kinetics, flow, and thermo-physical phenomena in engine exhaust aftertreatment systems have been coming forth since the 1960s when catalytic converters were introduced for vehicle applications {AQ: This word ‘catalystic’ is not found in standard dictionaries. Please check and correct if necessary.}. Such models can provide insightful understanding and mathematical descriptions on the chemical reactions, mass transfer, and heat transfer processes in one-dimensional and multi-dimensional fashions. The primary purpose of diesel engine aftertreatment system control-oriented models is to serve for the designs of real-time aftertreatment control and fault-diagnosis systems to reduce tailpipe emissions during real-world vehicle operations. Because such control-oriented models contain physically-meaningful parameters of the actual treatment systems, the model-based estimation and control algorithms can have excellent generalizability among different platforms.