  A supervisory observer is a multiple-model architecture, which estimates the
parameters and the states of nonlinear systems. It consists of a bank of state
observers, where each observer is designed for some nominal parameter values
sampled in a known parameter set. A selection criterion is used to select a
single observer at each time instant, which provides its state estimate and
parameter value. The sampling of the parameter set plays a crucial role in this
approach. Existing works require a sufficiently large number of parameter
samples, but no explicit lower bound on this number is provided. The aim of
this work is to overcome this limitation by sampling the parameter set
automatically using an iterative global optimisation method, called DIviding
RECTangles (DIRECT). Using this sampling policy, we start with 1 + 2np
parameter samples where np is the dimension of the parameter set. Then, the
algorithm iteratively adds samples to improve its estimation accuracy.
Convergence guarantees are provided under the same assumptions as in previous
works, which include a persistency of excitation condition. The efficacy of the
supervisory observer with the DIRECT sampling policy is illustrated on a model
of neural populations.
