Exponential stabilization of nonholonomic systems in power form

Preliminary version as Inria research report Nº 2126 "Time-varying exponential stabilization of nonholonomic systems in power form", December, 1993, http://hal.inria.fr/inria-00074546International audienceSystems in canonical power form have recently been used to model the kinematic equations of nonholonomic mechanical systems. The properties of homogeneous systems have been used in recent references to derive exponentially stabilizing continuous time-periodic feedbacks for this class of systems. Motivated by this work, the present study extends a control design method previously proposed by Samson to the design of such homogeneous feedbacks. The approach here followed has the advantage of yielding simple and direct stability proofs. Homogeneity-related results needed for time-varying exponential stabilization are also provided