FURI | Spring 2026

Vibration Suppression in Discrete Elastic Rods using Model Predictive Control

Reducing vibrations in soft structures is computationally expensive and highly sensitive to the location of the control force. This research integrates Discrete Elastic Rods (DER) with nonlinear Model Predictive Control (MPC) to capture bending and stretching energy as well as minimize displacement/kinetic energy. Additionally, by utilizing Bayesian Optimization the model is able to identify the optimal actuation node(s) with minimal effort. This is important because it identifies the solution much faster than brute force methods and provides a general foundation for control of complex soft/flexible systems while reducing the required computational power.