Siemens Aktiengesellschaft

Siemens Corporation

Georgia Tech Research Corporation

Thomas Gruenewald

George Lo

Hartmut Ludwig

Florian Ersch

Justinian Rosca

Lingyun Wang

Livio Dalloro

Andreas Scholz

Georg Muenzel

Mina Azib

Leandro Pfleger De Aguiar

Peter Kob

Christian Winkler

Kurt Dirk Bettenhausen

Ren-Yi Lo

Thomas R Kurfess

Phani Ram Kumar Kuruganty

Florian Erseh

Hermann Friedrich

Thomas Kurfess

Roby Lynn

Stephanie Locks

Swen Elpelt

Aoyu Chen

Dongmin Han

Nuodi Huang

A system for providing access to locally stored process image data to other devices in an industrial production environment includes a plurality of controller devices and a process image backbone. Each respective controller device comprises the following: a volatile computer-readable storage medium comprising a process image area; a non-volatile computer-readable storage medium; a control program configured to provide operating instructions to a production unit; an input/output component configured to update the process image area during each scan cycle or upon the occurrence of one or more events with process image data items associated with the production unit; and a historian component configured to locally store the process image data items of the process image area as time series data in the non-volatile computer-readable storage medium. The process image backbone provides the plurality of controllers with uniform access to the process image data items of each programmable logic device.

Universal data access across devices

A method of monitoring a track using train cars includes collecting first sensor data corresponding to a track location by a first sensor network on a first train car. Based on the first sensor data, a potential track anomaly at the track location is identified by a diagnostics system on the first train car. A message describing the anomaly is transmitted to diagnostics systems located on other train cars. The message is received by a second diagnostics system on a second train car located behind the first train car. The second diagnostics system determines a time at which the second train car will be passing over track location and, at the determined time, collects second sensor data. If the track anomaly is present in both the first sensor data and the second sensor data at the track location, a train control system is notified of the track anomaly.

Distributed bogie diagnostics for track monitoring

A system for autonomously providing functionality to a computerized control system includes a logic controller running a first computer application relating to an operations system and an application manager that receives requests for functionality from the first computer application. A remote marketplace client is in communication with the application manager and a remote marketplace that offers computer applications for providing a plurality of functionalities relating to the operations system. A computer application repository stores computer applications providing functionality of the operations system and responsive to receiving the request for functionality the application manager forwards the request to the remote marketplace client. The remote marketplace client queries the remote marketplace for the requested functionality and provides results of the query to the application manager. The application manager performs logic operations on the query results to identify an application to provide the requested functionality. The identified application is downloaded from the marketplace.

Apparatus and method for autonomously adding and removing of functionality in programmable logic controllers (PLCs)

A system for using digital twins to interact with physical objects in an automation system includes a plurality of controller devices, a process image backbone, and a registry comprising a plurality of digital twins. Each respective controller device comprises a volatile computer-readable storage medium comprising a process image area. The process image backbone provides the controllers with uniform access to the process image area of each controller. Each digital twin in the registry corresponds to a physical device controllable via one of the controllers devices via a corresponding process image area.

Process image within controllers enabling visibility and accessibility of real world objects

A control layer automation device comprises a processor, one or more control layer applications, a database, a wireless interface, a device memory. Each control layer application is configured to perform a discrete set of automation functions. The database comprises a plurality of operator device identifiers and the wireless interface allows the one or more control layer applications to communicate with a plurality of operator devices via the plurality of operator device identifiers. The device memory comprises the one or more control layer applications. The control layer application manager is configured to manage execution of the one or more control layer applications on the processor.

Provisioning of control layer applications for use in industrial control environments

A computer-implemented method of identifying federations of manufacturing apps using House of Quality (HoQ) analysis includes receiving user request information comprising a plurality of desired functions and an importance value for each of the plurality of desired functions and generating a correlation matrix between the plurality of apps, wherein each element of the correlation matrix indicates a degree of correlation between a pair of apps. A relationship matrix is generated which comprises numerical values indicating relationships between a plurality of apps and the plurality of desired functions, wherein each column of relationship matrix is associated with an app and each row is associated with a desired function. Next, a weighted matrix is created by multiplying each row in the relationship matrix by the importance value corresponding to the desired function associated with the row. The numerical values in each column of the weighted matrix are aggregated to determine a total value for each of the plurality of apps. A federation of apps is identified based on the correlation matrix and the total values determined for the plurality of apps.

House of quality for federated manufacturing apps

An automation system comprises a local threat information server operating within automation plant and a plurality of field devices operating at a control layer of the automation plant. The local threat information server is configured to: receive threat information from one or more external sources, receive plant information from one or more internal sources, set a threat level according to one or more of the threat information and the plant information, and distribute an indication of the threat level to one or more control layer devices. Each respective field device is configured to: receive the indication of the threat level, identify one or more security operations corresponding to the threat level, and execute the one or more security operations.

Self-defending smart field device and architecture

A programmable logic controller comprises a processor, a PLC operating environment, a device memory, and an app container. The PLC operating environment is configured to execute a controller automation program providing a plurality of skill functions. The device memory comprises a plurality of apps which are configured to perform a discrete set of automation functions using the plurality of skill functions. The app container is logically separate from the PLC operating environment and configured to provide a runtime environment for the apps.

Extending the functionality of a programmable logic controller (PLC) with apps without changing the PLC programming

A method of executing apps on a production device in an automation environment includes storing a plurality of apps in a runtime environment of the production device. A metadata file is stored for each respective app included in the plurality of apps. The metadata file comprises an indication of a network interface that may be used for communication with the respective app by other apps, and an indication of one or more interface dependencies to other network interfaces corresponding to other apps. Prior to executing a particular app on the production device, an operation is performed to verify that each interface dependency associated with the particular app can be fulfilled by the plurality of apps.

Interfaces for connected software applications in automation environments

A method for managing power consumption within a facility includes receiving a request to reduce a total level of power consumption within the facility by a predetermined measure (S). A plurality of operating parameters indicative of how much power is being consumed by each of a plurality of facility systems is received (S). A corresponding cost associated with a marginal power reduction is determined for each of the plurality of facility systems using the received plurality of operating parameters (S). A power allocation to the facility system of the plurality of facility systems that is determined to have a lowest marginal cost of power reduction is incrementally reduced (S). The steps of determining a corresponding cost and incrementally reducing power are repeated until the total level of power consumption within the facility has been reduced by the predetermined measure.

Integrated demand response for energy utilization

Systems and methods are described that allow a Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) to receive Demand Response (DR) data and process the data in a PLC Function Block (FB). Embodiments provide a PLC demand response FB that solicits DR data and a demand response load manager FB that compares the DR data with predetermined demand constraints corresponding to electrical equipment. The demand constraints provide energy consumption strategies for buildings and factories.

PLC function block for automated demand response integration

A computer readable medium embodying instructions executable by a processor to perform a method for hosting components implemented in different computer readable languages within one process. The method includes instantiating a container within a single process, creating a hosting environment for each of a plurality of components, and wherein loading the components by respective environments and wherein the hosting environments are objects instantiated within the container and within the one process, and wherein the plurality of components are implemented in respective a computer readable language, and instantiating a container communication framework object within the container and the one process for processing serialized messages of the components, wherein specific language adapters convert data types of the components to a common implementation, wherein the messages of the plurality of components are processed within the container.

Growing community of inventors

Somerset, NJ, United States of America

Thomas Gruenewald