History

Automatic control systems are a part of nature. The most important example of this is the human body. The pancreas’s regulation of blood sugar and the way adrenaline rises along with heart rate at high altitudes to ensure more oxygen is transported to the cells are among the primary examples of Automatic Control Systems in the human body.

The idea of using automatic control systems dates back to ancient times. The earliest control system was flow control, developed by Ctesibius in Alexandria in the 3rd century B.C. This method was used to control the flow rate in water clocks. After Ctesibius, Philyon of Byzantium worked on controlling the oil level in lamps. In the 1st century A.D., Heron of Alexandria developed a regulator for constant-speed liquid flow. In this system, a float and a siphon were used to ensure that water flowed at a constant rate.

Moving into more recent times, we see the temperature control system for an incubator unit invented by Cornelis Drebbel (1620). The temperature sensor used in the system consists of a glass container filled with alcohol and mercury, surrounded by water. When the fire heats the container and the water, the alcohol expands, causing the lever to move upward and bringing the damper closer to the top of the chimney. When the box cools, the alcohol contracts, the damper lever is pulled downward, and the fire flares up. The desired temperature is adjusted by the length of the lever.

The first example of speed control was applied to mills using rotating ball pendulums. This component, called a governor, was used in steam engines by James Watt in 1788.

The first mathematical study on control systems was a stability analysis published in 1868 in a paper titled “On Governors” by J. C. Maxwell. In this paper, Maxwell derived the differential equations of the governor, linearized them around the equilibrium point, and demonstrated that system stability is possible if the poles of the characteristic equation are negative. In 1877, E. J. Routh received an award for developing a stability criterion based on the characteristic equation. In 1893, the Russian mathematician A. M. Lyapunov worked on the stability of dynamic systems and analyzed motion using nonlinear differential equations. Lyapunov’s work laid the foundation for the State Variables approach. However, this approach did not enter the control literature until 1958.

These developments were followed by Nyquist’s stability analysis based on the frequency loop response in 1932 and the first PID control system developed by Callendes and colleagues in 1936.

W. R. Evans, who worked on aircraft control, developed the Root Locus method in 1948 to examine system behavior in terms of parameter changes in the characteristic equation. The feedback amplifier, developed by Bellman and Kabala in 1964, plays a significant role in feedback control systems.

Developments in automatic control systems continue at a rapid pace today and have become an indispensable part of our daily lives.

The Department of Control and Automation Engineering was established in 2009 under the Faculty of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at Yıldız Technical University with an academic staff consisting of 8 faculty members and 10 research assistants. The academic staff, who were also part of the department’s founding, served in the Control and Command Division of the Department of Electrical Engineering until 2010, when they were transferred to the Department of Control and Automation Engineering.

In 2011, the department admitted its first students to the 30% English-language program, and in 2013, it admitted its first students to the 100% English-language program. The Department of Control and Automation Engineering currently offers two distinct undergraduate programs: a 30% English-language program and a 100% English-language program. The YTÜ Department of Control and Automation Engineering, which graduated its first students from the 30% English-language program in 2015, aims to graduate its first students from the 100% English-language program in 2017. In addition to the undergraduate programs, the department has also been offering master’s and doctoral programs since 2002.

In addition to the Digital Electronics and Analog Electronics Laboratories that existed during the department’s founding phase, our university’s Yıldız-Beşiktaş Campus housed two international Industrial Automation Technology Laboratories: Phoenix Contact (June 2005) and Omron (November 2006) were established at our University’s Yıldız-Beşiktaş Campus. When we moved to the Davutpaşa Campus in August 2011, these international laboratories were renovated to incorporate state-of-the-art technologies and were relocated to larger facilities.

In addition to these laboratories, an international Schneider Electric Motion Control and Automation Laboratory, a HIMA Safety PLC-Safety Systems Laboratory, and Yorum Automation’s Unitronics (PLC+HMI) Laboratory have been established. Omron has also established a “Competence Center,” bringing the total laboratory space for this company to 400 m².  At the Davutpaşa Campus, the Control Systems Design Laboratory, CAD Laboratories, Measurement and Instrumentation Laboratory, and Motion Control Laboratory are in operation, along with the Microcontroller Laboratory. With the aim of finding solutions to the problems faced by our students, faculty members, and industry professionals, all of our laboratories have taken their place in the world of science and technology within the framework of university-industry collaboration.