A Hierarchical Concept for Man-Machine Communication

1974 ◽  
Vol 18 (5) ◽  
pp. 506-509 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. S. Albus ◽  
J. M. Evans ◽  
E. G. Johnsen
Keyword(s):  
Variable Mass ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Cerebellar Model Articulation Controller ◽  
Level Control ◽  
Control Functions ◽  
Control Concept ◽  
Point Trajectories ◽  
High Level ◽  
Automation Technology ◽  
Machine Communication

The problem of man controlling or programming a machine may be considered as a hierarchy of control functions, with each level of control calling up ordered sequences of operations at the next lower level, using appropriate sensory feedback for each level. Man may enter the control hierarchy at any level for direct control or for programming an automatic system for later playback. The computer carries out lower level control functions, thereby augmenting man's control capabilities. The Cerebellar Model Articulation Controller (CMAC) is a computer based control system in which high–level task–oriented commands can be broken down into a series of elemental motor actuator signals. CMAC is a general purpose adaptive control concept which can be arranged in a hierarchical structure, such as that described above, so as to facilitate the man–machine communication problem. For example, CMAC can solve the coordinate transformation problem so that commands can be given in terms of desired end point trajectories. Furthermore, CMAC can handle many feedback variables such as measurements of misalignment of parts, variable mass loading, irregularities in materials, and constraints imposed by an external environment. Concepts of man–machine communication under consideration by the NBS Automation Technology Porgram are presented with particular emphasis on the CMAC control concept.

scholarly journals Implementation of and experiences with new automation

2000 ◽  
Vol 22 (6) ◽  
pp. 199-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ifte Mahmud ◽  
David Kim
Keyword(s):  
Quality Assurance ◽  
Implementation Process ◽  
Regulatory Compliance ◽  
Contributing Factors ◽  
The Future ◽  
Industry Automation ◽  
High Level ◽  
Automation Technology ◽  
And Robotics ◽  
Testing Group

In an environment where cost, timeliness, and quality drives the business, it is essential to look for answers in technology where these challenges can be met. In the Novartis Pharmaceutical Quality Assurance Department, automation and robotics have become just the tools to meet these challenges. Although automation is a relatively new concept in our department, we have fully embraced it within just a few years. As our company went through a merger, there was a significant reduction in the workforce within the Quality Assurance Department through voluntary and involuntary separations. However the workload remained constant or in some cases actually increased. So even with reduction in laboratory personnel, we were challenged internally and from the headquarters in Basle to improve productivity while maintaining integrity in quality testing. Benchmark studies indicated the Suffern site to be the choice manufacturing site above other facilities. This is attributed to the Suffern facility employees' commitment to reduce cycle time, improve efficiency, and maintain high level of regulatory compliance. One of the stronger contributing factors was automation technology in the laboratoriess, and this technology will continue to help the site's status in the future. The Automation Group was originally formed about 2 years ago to meet the demands of high quality assurance testing throughput needs and to bring our testing group up to standard with the industry. Automation began with only two people in the group and now we have three people who are the next generation automation scientists. Even with such a small staff,we have made great strides in laboratory automation as we have worked extensively with each piece of equipment brought in. The implementation process of each project was often difficult because the second generation automation group came from the laboratory and without much automation experience. However, with the involvement from the users at ‘get-go’, we were able to successfully bring in many automation technologies. Our first experience with automation was SFA/SDAS, and then Zymark TPWII followed by Zymark Multi-dose. The future of product testing lies in automation, and we shall continue to explore the possibilities of improving the testing methodologies so that the chemists will be less burdened with repetitive and mundane daily tasks and be more focused on bringing quality into our products.

scholarly journals Robust Tracking Controller for a DC/DC Buck-Boost Converter–Inverter–DC Motor System

Energies ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 11 (10) ◽  
pp. 2500 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eduardo Hernández-Márquez ◽  
Carlos Avila-Rea ◽  
José García-Sánchez ◽  
Ramón Silva-Ortigoza ◽  
Gilberto Silva-Ortigoza ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Motor System ◽  
Dc Motor ◽  
Boost Converter ◽  
Differential Flatness ◽  
Robust Tracking ◽  
Level Control ◽  
Tracking Controller ◽  
The One ◽  
High Level ◽  
Better Than

This paper has two aims. The first is to develop a robust hierarchical tracking controller for the DC/DC Buck-Boost–inverter–DC motor system. This controller considers a high level control for the inverter–DC motor subsystems and a low level control for the DC/DC Buck-Boost converter subsystem. Such controls solve the tracking task associated with the angular velocity of the motor shaft and the output voltage of the converter, respectively, via the differential flatness approach. The second aim is to present a comparison of the robust hierarchical controller to a passive controller. This, with the purpose of showing that performance achieved with the hierarchical controller proposed in this paper, is better than the one achieved with the passive controller. Both controllers are experimentally implemented on a prototype of the DC/DC Buck-Boost–inverter–DC motor system by using Matlab-Simulink along with the DS1104 board from dSPACE. According to experimental results, the proposal in the present paper achieves a better performance than the passive controller.

scholarly journals SoC-FPGA systems for the acquisition and processing of electroencephalographic signals

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 237
Author(s):  
Matias Javier Oliva ◽  
Pablo Andrés García ◽  
Enrique Mario Spinelli ◽  
Alejandro Luis Veiga
Keyword(s):  
Embedded System ◽  
Real Time ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
System Response ◽  
Single Chip ◽  
Real Time Processing ◽  
General Purpose Processor ◽  
Time Operation ◽  
Electroencephalographic Signals ◽  
High Level

<span lang="EN-US">Real-time acquisition and processing of electroencephalographic signals have promising applications in the implementation of brain-computer interfaces. These devices allow the user to control a device without performing motor actions, and are usually made up of a biopotential acquisition stage and a personal computer (PC). This structure is very flexible and appropriate for research, but for final users it is necessary to migrate to an embedded system, eliminating the PC from the scheme. The strict real-time processing requirements of such systems justify the choice of a system on a chip field-programmable gate arrays (SoC-FPGA) for its implementation. This article proposes a platform for the acquisition and processing of electroencephalographic signals using this type of device, which combines the parallelism and speed capabilities of an FPGA with the simplicity of a general-purpose processor on a single chip. In this scheme, the FPGA is in charge of the real-time operation, acquiring and processing the signals, while the processor solves the high-level tasks, with the interconnection between processing elements solved by buses integrated into the chip. The proposed scheme was used to implement a brain-computer interface based on steady-state visual evoked potentials, which was used to command a speller. The first tests of the system show that a selection time of 5 seconds per command can be achieved. The time delay between the user’s selection and the system response has been estimated at 343 µs.</span>

scholarly journals A Runtime System for XML Transformations in Java

2004 ◽  
Vol 11 (33) ◽  
Author(s):  
Aske Simon Christensen ◽  
Christian Kirkegaard ◽  
Anders Møller
Keyword(s):  
Static Analysis ◽  
Programming Language ◽  
Program Analysis ◽  
Companion Paper ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Runtime System ◽  
Xml Documents ◽  
Level Data ◽  
High Level ◽  
The Given

We show that it is possible to extend a general-purpose programming language with a convenient high-level data-type for manipulating XML documents while permitting (1) precise static analysis for guaranteeing validity of the constructed XML documents relative to the given DTD schemas, and (2) a runtime system where the operations can be performed efficiently. The system, named Xact, is based on a notion of immutable XML templates and uses XPath for deconstructing documents. A companion paper presents the program analysis; this paper focuses on the efficient runtime representation.

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