Vertical Contracts for Safety Control

Armin Pirastehzad; Bart Besselink

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arXiv · 2603.25246

Vertical Contracts for Safety Control

Armin Pirastehzad·Bart Besselink

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Abstract

We propose a methodology that exploits the contract formalism to characterize the continuous-time safety control problem, which is often difficult to address, in terms of a discrete-time one, for which numerous efficient solution scheme exist. We construct contracts as pairs of assumptions and guarantees which are set-valued mappings that describe the safe boundaries within which the system must operate. By formalizing safety control as contract implementation, we develop a vertical hierarchy according to which we translate implementation from continuous to discrete time. We accomplish this by constructing a discrete-time system and a contract such that a solution to the continuous-time implementation problem can be characterized in terms of a solution to its discrete-time counterpart. We then use this characterization to construct a control input that establishes implementation in continuous time on the basis of the control sequence that achieves implementation in discrete time.

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Armin Pirastehzad, Bart Besselink. 2026-03-26. Vertical Contracts for Safety Control. https://arxiv.org/abs/2603.25246

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