On the uniform exponential stability of linear time-delay systems

Abstract

This paper deals with the global uniform exponential stability independent of delay of time-delay linear and time-invariant systems subject to point and distributed delays for the initial conditions being continuous real functions except possibly on a set of zero measure of bounded discontinuities. It is assumed that the delay-free system as well as an auxiliary one are globally uniformly exponentially stable and globally uniform exponential stability independent of delay, respectively. The auxiliary system is, typically, part of the overall dynamics of the delayed system but not necessarily the isolated undelayed dynamics as usually assumed in the literature. Since there is a great freedom in setting such an auxiliary system, the obtained stability conditions are very useful in a wide class of practical applications.