FAST : a fault detection and identification software tool

The aim of this work is to improve the reliability and safety of complex critical control systems by contributing to the systematic application of fault diagnosis. In order to ease the utilization of fault detection and isolation (FDI) tools in the industry, a systematic approach is required to allow the process engineers to analyze a system from this perspective. In this way, it should be possible to analyze this system to find if it provides the required fault diagnosis and redundancy according to the process criticality. In addition, it should be possible to evaluate what-if scenarios by slightly modifying the process (f.i. adding sensors or changing their placement) and evaluating the impact in terms of the fault diagnosis and redundancy possibilities. Hence, this work proposes an approach to analyze a process from the FDI perspective and for this purpose provides the tool FAST which covers from the analysis and design phase until the final FDI supervisor implementation in a real process. To synthesize the process information, a very simple format has been defined based on XML. This format provides the needed information to systematically perform the Structural Analysis of that process. Any process can be analyzed, the only restriction is that the models of the process components need to be available in the FAST tool. The processes are described in FAST in terms of process variables, components and relations and the tool performs the structural analysis of the process obtaining: (i) the structural matrix, (ii) the perfect matching, (iii) the analytical redundancy relations (if any) and (iv) the fault signature matrix. To aid in the analysis process, FAST can operate stand alone in simulation mode allowing the process engineer to evaluate the faults, its detectability and implement changes in the process components and topology to improve the diagnosis and redundancy capabilities. On the other hand, FAST can operate on-line connected to the process plant through an OPC interface. The OPC interface enables the possibility to connect to almost any process which features a SCADA system for supervisory control. When running in on-line mode, the process is monitored by a software agent known as the Supervisor Agent. FAST has also the capability of implementing distributed FDI using its multi-agent architecture. The tool is able to partition complex industrial processes into subsystems, identify which process variables need to be shared by each subsystem and instantiate a Supervision Agent for each of the partitioned subsystems. The Supervision Agents once instantiated will start diagnosing their local components and handle the requests to provide the variable values which FAST has identified as shared with other agents to support the distributed FDI process.Per tal de facilitar la utilització d'eines per la detecció i identificació de fallades (FDI) en la indústria, es requereix un enfocament sistemàtic per permetre als enginyers de processos analitzar un sistema des d'aquesta perspectiva. D'aquesta forma, hauria de ser possible analitzar aquest sistema per determinar si proporciona el diagnosi de fallades i la redundància d'acord amb la seva criticitat. A més, hauria de ser possible avaluar escenaris de casos modificant lleugerament el procés (per exemple afegint sensors o canviant la seva localització) i avaluant l'impacte en quant a les possibilitats de diagnosi de fallades i redundància. Per tant, aquest projecte proposa un enfocament per analitzar un procés des de la perspectiva FDI i per tal d'implementar-ho proporciona l'eina FAST la qual cobreix des de la fase d'anàlisi i disseny fins a la implementació final d'un supervisor FDI en un procés real. Per sintetitzar la informació del procés s'ha definit un format simple basat en XML. Aquest format proporciona la informació necessària per realitzar de forma sistemàtica l'Anàlisi Estructural del procés. Qualsevol procés pot ser analitzat, només hi ha la restricció de que els models dels components han d'estar disponibles en l'eina FAST. Els processos es descriuen en termes de variables de procés, components i relacions i l'eina realitza l'anàlisi estructural obtenint: (i) la matriu estructural, (ii) el Perfect Matching, (iii) les relacions de redundància analítica, si n'hi ha, i (iv) la matriu signatura de fallades. Per ajudar durant el procés d'anàlisi, FAST pot operar aïlladament en mode de simulació permetent a l'enginyer de procés avaluar fallades, la seva detectabilitat i implementar canvis en els components del procés i la topologia per tal de millorar les capacitats de diagnosi i redundància. Per altra banda, FAST pot operar en línia connectat al procés de la planta per mitjà d'una interfície OPC. La interfície OPC permet la possibilitat de connectar gairebé a qualsevol procés que inclogui un sistema SCADA per la seva supervisió. Quan funciona en mode en línia, el procés està monitoritzat per un agent software anomenat l'Agent Supervisor. Addicionalment, FAST té la capacitat d'implementar FDI de forma distribuïda utilitzant la seva arquitectura multi-agent. L'eina permet dividir sistemes industrials complexes en subsistemes, identificar quines variables de procés han de ser compartides per cada subsistema i generar una instància d'Agent Supervisor per cadascun dels subsistemes identificats. Els Agents Supervisor un cop activats, començaran diagnosticant els components locals i despatxant les peticions de valors per les variables que FAST ha identificat com compartides amb altres agents, per tal d'implementar el procés FDI de forma distribuïda.Postprint (published version

Engineering Education and Research Using MATLAB

MATLAB is a software package used primarily in the field of engineering for signal processing, numerical data analysis, modeling, programming, simulation, and computer graphic visualization. In the last few years, it has become widely accepted as an efficient tool, and, therefore, its use has significantly increased in scientific communities and academic institutions. This book consists of 20 chapters presenting research works using MATLAB tools. Chapters include techniques for programming and developing Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs), dynamic systems, electric machines, signal and image processing, power electronics, mixed signal circuits, genetic programming, digital watermarking, control systems, time-series regression modeling, and artificial neural networks

Study of Electron-Impact Induced Fragmentation of Thymine

The aim of the experiment described in this thesis was to generate a molecular beam of thymine and to investigate the fragmentation processes induced by low-energy electron impact. A molecular beam of thymine is generated by placing thymine in powder form inside a resistively heated oven. The beam of thymine is then crossed by a pulsed electron beam from an electron gun that consists of four electrostatic lens elements and a deflection system for steering the beam. A reflectron time-of-flight mass spectrometer with a microchannel plate detector is used to detect and mass resolve the positively charged fragments. LabVIEW based data acquisition techniques are used to accumulate the time-of-flight data as a function of electron impact energy. The work described in this thesis is based on a single data set of thymine with electric impact energy varied from 0.5 to 99.7 eV in steps of 0.5 V. To determine the yield of the various fragment ions, groups of peaks were fitted with a sequence of normalised Gaussian peaks using a specially developed LabVIEW program. Using this program the fitting of the peaks was done automatically for all electron energies. Excitation functions for the most positively ionised fragments have been extracted/or determine and their appearance energies have been determined and compared to current research on thymine. Because all excitation functions have been generated from this single data set and assuming that the detection efficiency of the RTOFMS is mass independent, the yield of all fragments are on the same relative scale and are comparable. Total ionisation cross sections have been obtained for our data set and are in good agreement with theoretical calculations

Embracing Analytics in the Drinking Water Industry

Analytics can support numerous aspects of water industry planning, management, and operations. Given this wide range of touchpoints and applications, it is becoming increasingly imperative that the championship and capability of broad-based analytics needs to be developed and practically integrated to address the current and transitional challenges facing the drinking water industry. Analytics will contribute substantially to future efforts to provide innovative solutions that make the water industry more sustainable and resilient. The purpose of this book is to introduce analytics to practicing water engineers so they can deploy the covered subjects, approaches, and detailed techniques in their daily operations, management, and decision-making processes. Also, undergraduate students as well as early graduate students who are in the water concentrations will be exposed to established analytical techniques, along with many methods that are currently considered to be new or emerging/maturing. This book covers a broad spectrum of water industry analytics topics in an easy-to-follow manner. The overall background and contexts are motivated by (and directly drawn from) actual water utility projects that the authors have worked on numerous recent years. The authors strongly believe that the water industry should embrace and integrate data-driven fundamentals and methods into their daily operations and decision-making process(es) to replace established ìrule-of-thumbî and weak heuristic approaches ñ and an analytics viewpoint, approach, and culture is key to this industry transformation

Photovoltaic Thermal hybrid collectors for a district CCHP system: modelling and optimization

Modellazione e simulazione di un sistema basato sulla tecnologia dei pannelli solari ibridi per la trigenerazione di energia destinata ad un uso residenziale. I carichi e le condizioni ambientali sono valori orari annuali tratti da banche dati per le città di Atene in Grecia e Vicenza in Italia. L'ottimizzazione sfrutta un algoritmo evolutivo per implementare un problema di ricerca del minimo. Le funzioni obiettivo usate sono parametri economici ed energetici.openEmbargo temporaneo per motivi di segretezza e/o di proprietà dei risultati e/o informazioni sensibil

Topology Considerations in Hybrid Electric Vehicle Powertrain Architecture Design.

Optimal system architecture (topology or configuration) design has been a challenging design problem because of its combinatorial nature. Parametric optimization studies make design decisions assuming a given architecture but there has been no general methodology that addresses design decisions on the system architecture itself. Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) powertrains allow various architecture alternatives created by connecting the engine, motor/generators and the output shaft in different ways through planetary gear systems. Addition of clutches to HEV powertrains allows changing the connection arrangement (configuration) among the powertrain components during the vehicle operation. Architectures with this capability are referred to as multi-mode architectures while architectures with fixed configurations are referred to as single-mode architectures. HEV architecture optimization requires designing the powertrain’s configuration and its sizing simultaneously. Additionally, evaluation of an HEV architecture design depends on a power management (control) strategy that distributes the power demand to the engine and motor/generators. Including this control problem increases the complexity of the HEV architecture design problem. This dissertation focuses on a general methodology to make design decisions on HEV powertrain architecture and component sizes. The representation of the architecture design problem is critical to solving this problem. A new general representation capable of describing all architecture alternatives is introduced. Using the representation, all feasible configurations are generated where these feasible configurations are used to create single- and multi-mode HEV architectures. Single-mode and multi-mode architecture design problems considering fuel economy, vehicle performance and architecture complexity are formulated separately and solution strategies are developed. The high complexity of the resulting optimization problem does not allow us to claim true optimality rigorously; therefore, the terms ``promising" or ``near-optimal" are more accurate in characterizing our results. The results show that different architectures must be designed for different applications. The case studies designing architectures for some available vehicles from the market find the architectures already implemented in these vehicles under some design constraints. Alternative architectures that improve these designs under different design constraints are also demonstrated. Architectures for a new application that is not available in the market are also designed.PHDMechanical EngineeringUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/111412/1/bayrak_1.pd

Towards computer-automated mechatronic design and optimization using linear graphs and evolutionary computing

A comparison of literature between the linear graph (LG) and bond graph (BG) approaches shows that the surpassing of BGs to LGs in applications related to the modeling of mechatronic systems is driven primarily by a lack of available LG-based software. As a result, a robust software toolbox called LGtheory has been developed for automating the evaluation of LG models in the MATLAB programming environment. This thesis details the development of LGtheory, and the algorithms and procedures employed for the evaluation of LG models. In addition, demonstrations of this toolbox to a process for automating the design of electronic filter circuits, as well as, the modeling and simulation of the dynamics of a mobile robotic system are presented. The results of these demonstrations validate the accuracy of the LGtheory toolbox for modeling complex multi-domain systems, and provides the methodological basis for the automated design of mechatronic systems using LGs