NASA Center for Intelligent Robotic Systems for Space Exploration

NASA's program for the civilian exploration of space is a challenge to scientists and engineers to help maintain and further develop the United States' position of leadership in a focused sphere of space activity. Such an ambitious plan requires the contribution and further development of many scientific and technological fields. One research area essential for the success of these space exploration programs is Intelligent Robotic Systems. These systems represent a class of autonomous and semi-autonomous machines that can perform human-like functions with or without human interaction. They are fundamental for activities too hazardous for humans or too distant or complex for remote telemanipulation. To meet this challenge, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) has established an Engineering Research Center for Intelligent Robotic Systems for Space Exploration (CIRSSE). The Center was created with a five year $5.5 million grant from NASA submitted by a team of the Robotics and Automation Laboratories. The Robotics and Automation Laboratories of RPI are the result of the merger of the Robotics and Automation Laboratory of the Department of Electrical, Computer, and Systems Engineering (ECSE) and the Research Laboratory for Kinematics and Robotic Mechanisms of the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Aeronautical Engineering, and Mechanics (ME,AE,&M), in 1987. This report is an examination of the activities that are centered at CIRSSE

Identification of Stochastic Timed Discrete Event Systems with st-IPN

[EN] This paper presents amethod for the identification of stochastic timed discrete event systems, based on the analysis of the behavior of the input and output signals, arranged in a timeline. To achieve this goal stochastic timed interpreted Petri nets are defined.These nets link timed discrete event systems modelling with stochastic time modelling. The procedure starts with the observation of the input/output signals; these signals are converted into events, so that the sequence of events is the observed language. This language arrives to an identifier that builds a stochastic timed interpreted Petri net which generates the same language. The identified model is a deterministic generator of the observed language.The identification method also includes an algorithm that determines when the identification process is over.This work was supported by a Grant from the Universidad del Cauca, reference 2.3-31.2/05 2011.Muñoz-Añasco, DM.; Correcher Salvador, A.; García Moreno, E.; Morant Anglada, FJ. (2014). Identification of Stochastic Timed Discrete Event Systems with st-IPN. Mathematical Problems in Engineering. 2014:1-21. https://doi.org/10.1155/2014/835312S1212014Cassandras, C. G., & Lafortune, S. (Eds.). (2008). Introduction to Discrete Event Systems. doi:10.1007/978-0-387-68612-7Yingwei Zhang, Jiayu An, & Chi Ma. (2013). Fault Detection of Non-Gaussian Processes Based on Model Migration. IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology, 21(5), 1517-1526. doi:10.1109/tcst.2012.2217966Ichikawa, A., & Hiraishi, K. (s. f.). Analysis and control of discrete event systems represented by petri nets. Lecture Notes in Control and Information Sciences, 115-134. doi:10.1007/bfb0042308Fanti, M. P., Mangini, A. M., & Ukovich, W. (2013). Fault Detection by Labeled Petri Nets in Centralized and Distributed Approaches. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 10(2), 392-404. doi:10.1109/tase.2012.2203596Cabasino, M. P., Giua, A., & Seatzu, C. (2010). Fault detection for discrete event systems using Petri nets with unobservable transitions. Automatica, 46(9), 1531-1539. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2010.06.013Hu, H., Zhou, M., Li, Z., & Tang, Y. (2013). An Optimization Approach to Improved Petri Net Controller Design for Automated Manufacturing Systems. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 10(3), 772-782. doi:10.1109/tase.2012.2201714Hu, H., Zhou, M., & Li, Z. (2011). Supervisor Optimization for Deadlock Resolution in Automated Manufacturing Systems With Petri Nets. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 8(4), 794-804. doi:10.1109/tase.2011.2156783Hiraishi, K. (1992). Construction of a class of safe Petri nets by presenting firing sequences. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 244-262. doi:10.1007/3-540-55676-1_14Estrada-Vargas, A. P., López-Mellado, E., & Lesage, J.-J. (2010). A Comparative Analysis of Recent Identification Approaches for Discrete-Event Systems. Mathematical Problems in Engineering, 2010, 1-21. doi:10.1155/2010/453254Shaolong Shu, & Feng Lin. (2013). I-Detectability of Discrete-Event Systems. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 10(1), 187-196. doi:10.1109/tase.2012.2215959Li, L., & Hadjicostis, C. N. (2011). Least-Cost Transition Firing Sequence Estimation in Labeled Petri Nets With Unobservable Transitions. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 8(2), 394-403. doi:10.1109/tase.2010.2070065Supavatanakul, P., Lunze, J., Puig, V., & Quevedo, J. (2006). Diagnosis of timed automata: Theory and application to the DAMADICS actuator benchmark problem. Control Engineering Practice, 14(6), 609-619. doi:10.1016/j.conengprac.2005.03.028Dotoli, M., Fanti, M. P., & Mangini, A. M. (2008). Real time identification of discrete event systems using Petri nets. Automatica, 44(5), 1209-1219. doi:10.1016/j.automatica.2007.10.014Chen, Y., Li, Z., Khalgui, M., & Mosbahi, O. (2011). Design of a Maximally Permissive Liveness- Enforcing Petri Net Supervisor for Flexible Manufacturing Systems. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 8(2), 374-393. doi:10.1109/tase.2010.2060332Murata, T. (1989). Petri nets: Properties, analysis and applications. Proceedings of the IEEE, 77(4), 541-580. doi:10.1109/5.24143Ramirez-Trevino, A., Ruiz-Beltran, E., Aramburo-Lizarraga, J., & Lopez-Mellado, E. (2012). Structural Diagnosability of DES and Design of Reduced Petri Net Diagnosers. IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics - Part A: Systems and Humans, 42(2), 416-429. doi:10.1109/tsmca.2011.2169950Ramirez-Trevino, A., Ruiz-Beltran, E., Rivera-Rangel, I., & Lopez-Mellado, E. (2007). Online Fault Diagnosis of Discrete Event Systems. A Petri Net-Based Approach. IEEE Transactions on Automation Science and Engineering, 4(1), 31-39. doi:10.1109/tase.2006.872120Toutenburg, H. (1974). Fleiss, J. L.: Statistical Methods for Rates and Proportions. John Wiley & Sons, New York-London-Sydney-Toronto 1973. XIII, 233 S. Biometrische Zeitschrift, 16(8), 539-539. doi:10.1002/bimj.19740160814Livingston, E. H., & Cassidy, L. (2005). Statistical Power and Estimation of the Number of Required Subjects for a Study Based on the t-Test: A Surgeon’s Primer. Journal of Surgical Research, 126(2), 149-159. doi:10.1016/j.jss.2004.12.013Ruppert, D. (2011). Statistics and Data Analysis for Financial Engineering. Springer Texts in Statistics. doi:10.1007/978-1-4419-7787-

Discrete events: Perspectives from system theory

Systems Theory;differentiaal/ integraal-vergelijkingen

Scheduling and discrete event control of flexible manufacturing systems based on Petri nets

A flexible manufacturing system (FMS) is a computerized production system that can simultaneously manufacture multiple types of products using various resources such as robots and multi-purpose machines. The central problems associated with design of flexible manufacturing systems are related to process planning, scheduling, coordination control, and monitoring. Many methods exist for scheduling and control of flexible manufacturing systems, although very few methods have addressed the complexity of whole FMS operations. This thesis presents a Petri net based method for deadlock-free scheduling and discrete event control of flexible manufacturing systems. A significant advantage of Petri net based methods is their powerful modeling capability. Petri nets can explicitly and concisely model the concurrent and asynchronous activities, multi-layer resource sharing, routing flexibility, limited buffers and precedence constraints in FMSs. Petri nets can also provide an explicit way for considering deadlock situations in FMSs, and thus facilitate significantly the design of a deadlock-free scheduling and control system. The contributions of this work are multifold. First, it develops a methodology for discrete event controller synthesis for flexible manufacturing systems in a timed Petri net framework. The resulting Petri nets have the desired qualitative properties of liveness, boundedness (safeness), and reversibility, which imply freedom from deadlock, no capacity overflow, and cyclic behavior, respectively. This precludes the costly mathematical analysis for these properties and reduces on-line computation overhead to avoid deadlocks. The performance and sensitivity of resulting Petri nets, thus corresponding control systems, are evaluated. Second, it introduces a hybrid heuristic search algorithm based on Petri nets for deadlock-free scheduling of flexible manufacturing systems. The issues such as deadlock, routing flexibility, multiple lot size, limited buffer size and material handling (loading/unloading) are explored. Third, it proposes a way to employ fuzzy dispatching rules in a Petri net framework for multi-criterion scheduling. Finally, it shows the effectiveness of the developed methods through several manufacturing system examples compared with benchmark dispatching rules, integer programming and Lagrangian relaxation approaches

Strict Minimal Siphon-Based Colored Petri Net Supervisor Synthesis for Automated Manufacturing Systems With Unreliable Resources

Various deadlock control policies for automated manufacturing systems with reliable and shared resources have been developed, based on Petri nets. In practical applications, a resource may be unreliable. Thus, the deadlock control policies proposed in previous studies are not applicable to such applications. This paper proposes a two-step robust deadlock control strategy for systems with unreliable and shared resources. In the first step, a live (deadlock-free) controlled system that does not consider the failure of resources is derived by using strict minimal siphon control. The second step deals with deadlock control issues caused by the failures of the resources. Considering all resource failures, a common recovery subnet based on colored Petri nets is proposed for all resource failures in the Petri net model. The recovery subnet is added to the derived system at the first step to make the system reliable. The proposed method has been tested using an automated manufacturing system deployed at King Saud University.publishedVersio

A petri-net based methodology for modeling, simulation, and control of flexible manufacturing systems

Global competition has made it necessary for manufacturers to introduce such advanced technologies as flexible and agile manufacturing, intelligent automation, and computer-integrated manufacturing. However, the application extent of these technologies varies from industry to industry and has met various degrees of success. One critical barrier leading to successful implementation of advanced manufacturing systems is the ever-increasing complexity in their modeling, analysis, simulation, and control. The purpose of this work is to introduce a set of Petri net-based tools and methods to address a variety of problems associated with the design and implementation of flexible manufacturing systems (FMSs). More specifically, this work proposes Petri nets as an integrated tool for modeling, simulation, and control of flexible manufacturing systems (FMSs). The contributions of this work are multifold. First, it demonstrates a new application of PNs for simulation by evaluating the performance of pull and push diagrams in manufacturing systems. Second, it introduces a class of PNs, Augmented-timed Petri nets (ATPNs) in order to increase the power of PNs to simulate and control flexible systems with breakdowns. Third, it proposes a new class of PNs called Realtime Petri nets (RTPNs) for discrete event control of FMS s. The detailed comparison between RTPNs and traditional discrete event methods such as ladder logic diagrams is presented to answer the basic question \u27Why is a PN better tool than ladder logic diagram?\u27 and to justify the PN method. Also, a conversion procedure that automatically generates PN models from a given class of logic control specifications is presented. Finally, a methodology that uses PNs for the development of object-oriented control software is proposed. The present work extends the PN state-of-the-art in two ways. First, it offers a wide scope for engineers and managers who are responsible for the design and the implementation of modem manufacturing systems to evaluate Petri nets for applications in their work. Second, it further develops Petri net-based methods for discrete event control of manufacturing systems

Performance Analysis of An Experimental Micro Flexible Manufacturing System (FMS)

Due to advanced technology, it is very important the performance of FMS for sensivity, production quality, repeatability and energy consumptions. Flexible manufacturing systems (FMSs) are the most automated and technologically sophisticated of the machine cell types used to implement cellular manufacturing. An FMS usually has multiple automated stations and is capable of variable routings among stations, while its flexibility allows it to operate as a mixed model system. The FMS concept integrates many of the advanced technologies that we met in previous units, including flexible automation, CNC machines, distributed computer control, and automated material handling and storage. In this experimental investigation, vibration and accelerations analysis of an experimental FMS with 5 degrees of freedom robot manipulator are presented. Firstly, experimental measurement of accelerations and vibrations are trained with a vibration measurement system and sensors. However, the process of production of part is a cycle of exact production time

On the Enforcement of a Class of Nonlinear Constraints on Petri Nets

International audienceThis paper focuses on the enforcement of nonlinear constraints in Petri nets. First, a supervisory structure is proposed for a nonlinear constraint. The proposed structure consists of added places and transitions. It controls the transitions in the net to be controlled only but does not change its states since there is no arc between the added transitions and the places in the original net. Second, an integer linear programming model is proposed to transform a nonlinear constraint to a minimal number of conjunc-tive linear constraints that have the same control performance as the nonlinear one. By using a place invariant based method, the obtained linear constraints can be easily enforced by a set of control places. The control places consist to a supervisor that can enforce the given nonlinear constraint. On condition that the admissible markings space of a nonlinear constraint is non-convex, another integer linear programming model is developed to obtain a minimal number of constraints whose disjunctions are equivalent to the nonlinear constraint. Finally, a number of examples are provided to demonstrate the proposed approach

Plasma sprayed titanium coatings with/without a shroud

Abstract: Titanium coatings were deposited by plasma spraying with and without a shroud. The titanium coatings were then assessed by scanning electron microscopy. A comparison in microstructure between titanium coatings with and without the shroud was carried out. The results showed that the shroud played an important role in protecting the titanium particles from oxidation. The presence of the shroud led to a reduction in coating porosity. The reduction in air entrainment with t he shroud resulted in better heating of the particles, and an enhanced microstructure with lower porosity in the shrouded titanium coatings were observed compared to the air plasma sprayed counterpart