This book provides a systematic, rigorous and self-contained treatment of positive dynamical systems. A dynamical system is positive when all relevant variables of a system are nonnegative in a natural way. This is in biology, demography or economics, where the levels of populations or prices of goods are positive. The principle also finds application in electrical engineering, physics and computer sciences. "The author has greatly expanded the field of positive systems in surprising ways." - Prof. Dr. David G. Luenberger, Stanford University(USA)

​This book comprises selected papers of the 26th International Conference on Difference Equations and Applications, ICDEA 2021, held virtually at the University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in July 2021. The book includes the latest and significant research and achievements in difference equations, discrete dynamical systems, and their applications in various scientific disciplines. The book is interesting for Ph.D. students and researchers who want to keep up to date with the latest research, developments, and achievements in difference equations, discrete dynamical systems, and their applications, the real-world problems.

This book gives a mathematical treatment of the introduction to qualitative differential equations and discrete dynamical systems. The treatment includes theoretical proofs, methods of calculation, and applications. The two parts of the book, continuous time of differential equations and discrete time of dynamical systems, can be covered independently in one semester each or combined together into a year long course. The material on differential equations introduces the qualitative or geometric approach through a treatment of linear systems in any dimension. There follows chapters where equilibria are the most important feature, where scalar (energy) functions is the principal tool, where periodic orbits appear, and finally, chaotic systems of differential equations. The many different approaches are systematically introduced through examples and theorems. The material on discrete dynamical systems starts with maps of one variable and proceeds to systems in higher dimensions. The treatment starts with examples where the periodic points can be found explicitly and then introduces symbolic dynamics to analyze where they can be shown to exist but not given in explicit form. Chaotic systems are presented both mathematically and more computationally using Lyapunov exponents. With the one-dimensional maps as models, the multidimensional maps cover the same material in higher dimensions. This higher dimensional material is less computational and more conceptual and theoretical. The final chapter on fractals introduces various dimensions which is another computational tool for measuring the complexity of a system. It also treats iterated function systems which give examples of complicated sets. In the second edition of the book, much of the material has been rewritten to clarify the presentation. Also, some new material has been included in both parts of the book. This book can be used as a textbook for an advanced undergraduate course on ordinary differential equations and/or dynamical systems. Prerequisites are standard courses in calculus (single variable and multivariable), linear algebra, and introductory differential equations.

Positive systems are an important class of systems that frequently arise in application areas, such as in the chemical process industry, electronic circuit design, communication networks, and biology. The study of the stability of such systems differs from standard systems in that the analysis focuses only on the trajectories generated under positivity constraints. Switched positive systems also arise in a variety of applications. Examples can be found in TCP congestion control, in processes described by non-homogeneous Markov chains, in image processing, in biochemical networks, and so on. In comparison to general switched systems, that have received a lot of attention in the past years, the theory for positive switched systems is still in its infancy. Switched Positive Linear Systems studies the stability, performance evaluation, stabilization via switching control, and optimal control of (continuous-time and linear) positive switched systems. It provides a review of the results that have already been established in the literature. Other results, especially those related to norm computation and optimization, are new and are presented integrated with previous ones. Switched Positive Linear Systems provides a comprehensive and timely introduction to the study of such systems. Readers who are new to the topic will find everything required to understand such systems in a concise and accessible form.

This comprehensive book provides the first unified framework for stability and dissipativity analysis and control design for nonnegative and compartmental dynamical systems, which play a key role in a wide range of fields, including engineering, thermal sciences, biology, ecology, economics, genetics, chemistry, medicine, and sociology. Using the highest standards of exposition and rigor, the authors explain these systems and advance the state of the art in their analysis and active control design. Nonnegative and Compartmental Dynamical Systems presents the most complete treatment available of system solution properties, Lyapunov stability analysis, dissipativity theory, and optimal and adaptive control for these systems, addressing continuous-time, discrete-time, and hybrid nonnegative system theory. This book is an indispensable resource for applied mathematicians, dynamical systems theorists, control theorists, and engineers, as well as for researchers and graduate students who want to understand the behavior of nonnegative and compartmental dynamical systems that arise in areas such as biomedicine, demographics, epidemiology, pharmacology, telecommunications, transportation, thermodynamics, networks, heat transfer, and power systems.

This book presents high-quality original contributions on positive systems, including those with positivity in compartmental switched systems, Markovian jump systems, Boolean networks, interval observer design, fault detection, and delay systems. It comprises a selection of the best papers from POSTA 2018, the 6th International Conference on Positive Systems, which was held in Hangzhou, China, in August 2018. The POSTA conference series represents a targeted response to the growing need for research that reports on and critically discusses a wide range of topics concerning the theory and applications of positive systems. The book offers valuable insights for researchers in applied mathematics, control theory and their applications.