1,720,999 research outputs found
Leveraging BIM and Mixed Reality to Actualize Lean Construction
No full textLean construction is made of principles, measures and methods that aim at maximizing process efficiency. Several tools have been developed to minimize waste, maximize customer value, improve the conduction of processes, and pursue other sub-objectives in construction. This effort is becoming more and more important due to the rising construction project size and variety, displacement of resources in diverse geographic locations, high-performance pressure. This paper reports the development and on-site tests in a real-life demonstrator of two management tools, which apply some principles of lean construction management at the design and delivery phases. The first one takes advantage of the integration between BIM and mixed reality, having the final aim of improving collaboration and communication among the actors involved. The second one exploits BIM modelling and search algorithms within a process-based management platform, in order to facilitate short-cycle planning and distributed decision-making in the production process. Both tools have been tested in the case of a building renovation project. The results show that they can improve communication efficiency, reduce rework, speed up work monitoring, control and supervising in construction management, and that they can address several of Liker’s lean principles, as classified by the 4P model
A database-centric approach for the modeling, simulation and control of cyberphysical systems in the factory of the future
No full textThe path towards Industrie 4.0, requires that factory automation problems cope with the cyber-physical
system complexity and its challenges. Some practical experiences and literature in the field testify that
the role of the database management systems is becoming central for control and automation technology
in the new industrial scenario. This article proposes database-centric technology and architectures that
seamlessly integrate networking, artificial intelligence and real-time control issues into a unified model
of computing. The proposed methodology is also viable for the development of simulation and rapid
prototyping tools for smart and advanced industrial automation
Tiny Cyber-Physical Systems for Performance Improvement in the Factory of the Future
No full textThe present work extends a performance metrics method for the treatability of some classes of problems in manufacturing automation that can be represented as a systemof-
systems controlled by a cyber-physical infrastructure. With the use of proper distributed and recursive computing approaches, the complexity of the control of cyber-physical systems can be attacked through a unified and human-centered simple framework that complies with the forthcoming pervasive computing challenges posed by the smart manufacturing scenarios. The aim of this work is to provide the proof of concept of an effective methodology that relies on the decomposition of a production goal into a hierarchical self-similar structure of subgoals for the steering of the system towards improved effectiveness. An implementation of the technique is proposed by means of multi-actor and multi-database paradigms. The simulation of an implementation and an experimental deployment on low cost embedded device is provided
Embedded system for a Ballbot robot
No full textThis paper presents an embedded system for a ballbot robotic platform, which is a balanced omnidirectional mobile robot that moves on a sphere. It provides a higher degree of maneuverability compared to the wheeled mobile robots. The robot balances it on a ball and gives to the system only one contact point with the ground. This allows to reduce the friction
and the space needed by the system to turn around a point. This is a major feature for a mobile vehicle, considering that most of them rotate their whole body to obtain a change in direction. The proposed platform is self-contained with on-board sensing and computation, it uses only off-the-shelf components and is designed to perform maneuvers when operating in tight spaces as in the human environments. The proposed embedded system is based on a general pourpose embedded board equipped with a 32bit microcontroller which is able to manage all the basic tasks of this robotic platform: sensing, actuation, control and communication. The proposed system is described and initial experimental results are introduced, furthermore the challenges faced are presented
RMAS architecture for industrial agents in IEC 61499
No full textThis paper analyses an architecture, recently proposed and under development, that aims to render the design and the development of multi-agent systems viable for the vision and the needs of the industry in the cyber-physical systems era. Prominent standardization work is currently focusing on the IEC 61499 standard as a most promising basis for the integration of industrial agents in the real field. In this context, authors propose RMAS (Relational Multi-Agent System) as a possible useful aid and means for the researches and the practices in the field. On this purpose, the compliances and the possible overlaps between the major features and capabilities of RMAS and IEC 61499 are assessed and discussed. This work aims to constitute a position paper for the future possible developments around IEC 61499
Performance Improvement in CPSs over Self-similar System Structures
No full textThe present paper presents the further developement of a solution for the performance improvement of distributed cyber-physical systems that approximate complex productive processes, introducing self-similarities in holonic systems. The proposed methodology provides a viable solution for a manufacturing system that integrates robotics, mechatronics and automation systems at different levels. Performance measurements and bottlenecks detection on critical production paths achieve a pervasive control of the effectiveness of associated the system-of-systems by means of a well-defined sequence of specific and minimal corrective actions. This work presents an extension to n-th degree of formulas previously applied to tree structures of the 2nd degree
Representation of nonlinear random transformations by non-Gaussian stochastic neural networks
No full textThe learning capability of neural networks is equivalent to modeling physical events that occur in the real environment. Several early works have demonstrated that neural networks belonging to some classes are universal approximators of input-output deterministic functions. Recent works extend the ability of neural networks in approximating random functions using a class of networks named stochastic neural networks (SNN). In the language of system theory, the approximation of both deterministic and stochastic functions falls within the identification of nonlinear no-memory systems. However, all the results presented so far are restricted to the case of Gaussian stochastic processes (SPs) only, or to linear transformations that guarantee this property. This paper aims at investigating the ability of stochastic neural networks to approximate nonlinear input-output random transformations, thus widening the range of applicability of these networks to nonlinear systems with memory. In particular, this study shows that networks belonging to a class named non-Gaussian stochastic approximate identity neural networks (SAINNs) are capable of approximating the solutions of large classes of nonlinear random ordinary differential transformations. The effectiveness of this approach is demonstrated and discussed by some application examples
An algorithm for modelling the manufacturing plant based on energy performances and productivity KPIs
No full textEnergy efficiency, performance of equipments, processes and production plants are present challenges in the context of sustainable manufacturing. Energy consumption is also the main economic, environmental and societal issue. Manufacturing plays a major role in energy consumption. Nowadays these challenges can be addressed by pursuing Energy Efficient Manufacturing. Productivity key performance indicators (KPIs) are powerful tool to measure performance from the shop-floor up to the plant level. They are used to optimize manufacturing processes but generally they do not take into account energy consumption. In this paper an energy consumption model based on productivity KPIs is used to investigate performances at the plant level and an algorithm is proposed to evaluate the effectiveness of actions over time whilst achieving overall improvements of the energy efficiency
ChoEn: A Smart Contract Based Choreography Enforcer
No full textThis work deals with the automatic generation of smart contracts to enforce compliance to a given BPMN choreography of requests sent by a set of independent actors. The choice of smart contracts is justified by the desire not to centralize the enforcement process when there are multiple independent actors characterized by low mutual trust. The choice of BPMN choreographies as an alternative to BPMN processes and collaborations is instead justified by the desire to leave the actors free to dynamically organize their internal processes in the way they prefer, provided that the interactions with the other actors respect some agreed protocol. This work proposes a formal framework to interpret choreographies and translate them onto smart contract enforcers. The framework has been implemented on a free open-source tool named ChoEn and tested by means of a running exampl
A Database-Centric Framework for the Modeling, Simulation, and Control of Cyber-Physical Systems in the Factory of the Future
No full textThe factory of the future scenario asks for new approaches to cope with the incoming challenges and complexity of cyber-physical systems. The role of database management systems is becoming central for control and automation technology in this new industrial scenario. This article proposes database-centric technology and architecture that aims to seamlessly integrate networking, artificial intelligence, and real-time control issues into a unified model of computing. The proposed methodology is also viable for the development of a framework that features simulation and rapid prototyping tools for smart and advanced industrial automation. The full expression of the potentialities in the presented approach is expected in particular for applications where tiny and distributed embedded devices collaborate to a shared computing task of relevant complexity
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