Calculating Transfer Function of a

State-Space Realization

Problem 1. Calculate the transfer function for the following system:

0
1

0
0

0
1

..
x = ...
x + .. u,
.

1
1
a0 a1 an1


y = b0 b1 bn1 x.
Solution.

s 1 0
0
0 s 1

..
sI A = ...
,
.

0
s
1
a0 a1
s + an1

s 1 0
s 1 0 0
0 s 1
0 s 1 0

det(sI A) = (s + an1 ) det

+ 1. det
..
..
..
..

.
.
.
.
0 0

s
a0 a1

s 1 0
0 s 1

det(sI A) = sn1 (s + an1 ) + det

..
..

.
.
a0 a1

= s + an1 s

n1

+ + a1 s + a0 .

In the next step, we calculate the last column of adj(sI A):


T
adj(sI A) = cof(sI A) .

0
0

an2

0
0

an2

This is equivalent of computing the last row of the cofactor matrix

s 1 0
0
0 s 1

..

.
..
sI A = .
,

0
s
1
a0 a1
s + an1

..

cof(sI A) =

n1
n+1
n2
n+2
n2
n1
(1) (1)
(1) (1) s (1)s
s

..
.

=
.
n2
n1
1 s s
s
Remark 1. For a given matrix A, its cofactor matrix is given by


i+j
cof ij (A) = (1) det(Aij ) ,

(1)

where Aij is a submatrix of A which is formed by eliminating the i-th row and j-th column.

1

s

.
..
adj(sI A) =
,

n2

s

sn1

1
s

..
adj(sI A)B = . ,
n2
s
sn1

Cadj(sI A)B = (b0

G(s) =

1
s
..
.

b1 bn1 )
= b0 + b1 s + + bn1 sn1 .
n2
s
sn1
bn1 sn1 + + b1 s + b0
.
sn + an1 sn1 + + a1 s + a0