Tracking Through Decoupling Singularities: A Singularity-Robust Homotopy-Continuation Extension of Feedback Linearization
Input--output feedback linearization fails at decoupling singularities, where the decoupling matrix loses rank, the relative degree is lost, and the linearizing control becomes unbounded. This paper develops a singularity-robust trajectory-tracking controller for square nonlinear control-affine systems that tracks through isolated decoupling singularities with bounded control. The method recasts tracking as real-time arc-length homotopy continuation, equivalently a continuous-time Newton/Davidenko flow, and replaces the inverse decoupling matrix by the least-norm Moore--Penrose solution of an augmented matrix $A=[\Lambda\mid b]$, where $b$ is the homotopy direction. A transversality condition $w^T b \ne 0$, with $w$ in the left null space of the decoupling matrix, keeps the augmented matrix full row rank through a generic rank-one loss. The resulting flow agrees with feedback linearization away from the singular set, tracks with $O(1/k)$ error, and re-locks after each crossing. The theory also characterizes the reflection-versus-branch-crossing dichotomy at Whitney folds and relates the reflection case to a Filippov sliding mode. Extensions cover dynamic relative-degree-one minimum-phase systems and arbitrary relative degree via filtered-error reduction. Simulations include a redundant 2-DOF manipulator, relative-degree-one and relative-degree-two plants, and a dual-active-bridge series-resonant DC/DC converter, where the method performs bounded inversion across buck/boost and resonance singularities while preserving zero-voltage soft switching.