Feedback Systems: An Introduction for Scientists and Engineers¶

Course Overview¶

• Institution: Caltech
• Course code: CDS 101 / CDS 110
• Track: Control Systems
• Tier: S
• Role: Mainline
• Level: Not standardized by provider (use prerequisites)
• Last reviewed: 2026-07-28

The author-maintained second-edition companion for Caltech's Feedback Systems: An Introduction for Scientists and Engineers builds a text-based feedback-systems spine from the open book, examples, exercises, and updated Python figure sources; it is not a complete current course run, and the instructor exercise manual remains restricted.

Why choose this course

Mainline course. A particularly complete and well-structured option for this track. Review note: S/A

Before you start

• Recommended foundation: Signals and Systems
• Recommended foundation: Engineering Mathematics

Verifiable learning outcomes

• Explain the core models in Control Systems, including their assumptions and limits
• Solve representative derivations and problems, checking units, limiting cases, or numerical results
• Complete a reproducible experiment or implementation with raw data, parameters, versions, and verification

Workload and pacing

13 weeks at 9 hours/week. This maintainer planning estimate is derived from course role and the density of public practice and labs; it is not a provider workload promise. Pilot two weeks while logging instruction, practice, lab, and review time, then adjust the remaining plan when actual effort differs by more than 25%.

Safety level

Simulation only. The default practice scope is software, computation, or simulation only; a lab label in the resource inventory does not authorize connecting physical equipment, and any hardware extension requires provider-scope verification and a new risk assessment.

Course Resources¶

Software, hardware, and cost

Software

• Maintainer-suggested open-source/free verification path: Python 3, Jupyter, python-control, SciPy, and GNU Octave
• The resource inventory lists public code coverage; pin interpreter, dependencies, toolchain, datasets, and PDK versions where applicable

Hardware

• The resource inventory lists lab coverage, but this course's maintainer path explicitly limits it to computational or simulation work. It assumes only a general-purpose computer able to run the software above and retain results; do not purchase or connect a course-supported low-voltage plant, sensors, actuators, real-time controller, and emergency shutdown

Cost note

The current maintainer path uses computation and simulation only, with no dedicated hardware purchase, and prefers open-source/free tools. This is not a provider requirement; platform, commercial-software, or cloud-compute costs still vary by provider, region, and plan.

Public resource coverage

Resources and access

“Listed by official page” means the link was discovered on a successfully fetched official source on the verification date; it does not guarantee that every region or account can open the target directly. Access does not grant redistribution rights. Re-check the provider page, target link, and third-party notices before downloading, adapting, or publishing material.

Practice and Verification¶

Practice loop

Feedback Systems: An Introduction for Scientists and Engineers · Caltech CDS 101 / CDS 110: Robust Closed-Loop and Model-Mismatch Audit

This is a maintainer-suggested self-study project for Feedback Systems: An Introduction for Scientists and Engineers · Caltech CDS 101 / CDS 110, not an official course assignment. Design baseline and improved controllers for a simulated plant in Control Systems, quantifying stability, tracking, disturbance rejection, saturation, and parameter mismatch.

Origin: Maintainer-suggested project

Deliverables

• Plant equations, parameter ranges, actuator and sensor constraints, and control metrics
• Open-loop model, baseline controller, improved controller, and simulation tests
• Raw state, control, and metric data for step, disturbance, noise, and parameter sweeps
• A report comparing stability margins, overshoot, settling time, energy, and failure regions

Verification

• Keep the nominal closed loop stable and meet predeclared overshoot and settling-time thresholds
• Cover zero reference, maximum reference, actuator saturation, sample delay, and parameter extremes
• Cross-check time-domain results with pole or frequency margins or a Lyapunov argument
• Increase parameter mismatch until the first instability and report the stability boundary and safe degraded behavior

Reproducibility

• Commit model, controller, scenario, test, analysis, and plotting sources
• Pin solver, step size, parameters, random seeds, and controller version
• Preserve raw trajectories, controller configurations, and the generated report

Safety boundary: Simulation only — Control simulated plants only; do not deploy the exercise controller to real motors, vehicles, drones, medical, chemical, or power equipment.

Risks, gaps, and boundaries

The author-maintained second-edition companion provides the open text, examples, exercises, and updated Python sources, but it is not a complete current course run; the instructor exercise manual remains restricted.

Completion evidence

• Weekly learning log with time, questions, corrected errors, decisions, next steps, and links to that week's reproducible artifacts
• Theory dossier with explicit assumptions, notation, derivation, units, and boundary conditions, checked by at least one independent method
• Simulation package with model or netlist, inputs, solver and version, parameter-sweep script, benchmark comparison, expected results, and one rerun command
• Code repository with pinned dependencies and toolchain, a minimal run command, tests or waveform/benchmark checks, expected output, and license notes