Observability of nonlinear time-delay systems and its application to their state realization

In this letter, it is shown that the two notions of weak observability and strong observability may not be sufficient to describe the link between the input/output equation associated to the behaviour of a system and its state space realization. A new notion, called regular observability, is introduced, which is shown to capture essential features of nonlinear time delay systems and the existence of some realization.