Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Preliminary Report on Research Needs (1993)

This bibliography is annotated to provide a synthesis of recent reports and current initiatives regarding information technology and manufacturing research.

Advanced Research Projects Agency. 1993. Program Information Package for Defense Technology Conversion, Reinvestment, and Transition Assistance. Washington, D.C. This booklet, distributed by ARPA, describes, among other things, the mission, strategy, activities, statutory programs, and selection criteria of the Technology Reinvestment Program. The selection criteria include the following technology focus areas:

• Process control for electronics manufacturing, i.e., the integration of in situ sensors, control algorithms, and process models and their application to critical manufacturing processes to achieve a real-time process control capability significantly beyond that possible today; and

• Design environments and tools needed to support the development of products from concept to fielding, including the engineering frameworks, integrated product and process descriptions, and analysis tools to support the designer.

Chern, Bernard. 1992. “Charge to the Workshop,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. In outlining the issues to be addressed by workshop participants, Chern said that NSF’s FY 1993 budget request for manufacturing-related research focuses on:

• Advanced computer and information technologies that support distributed design and intelligent manufacturing of objects;

• System-level issues that arise in understanding, modeling, and integrating the component manufacturing technologies to form integrated manufacturing systems;

• The computing and networking infrastructure and services necessary to realize distributed design and manufacturing;

• The development of new paradigms for manufacturing;

• The integration of design, manufacturing, and business management processes; and

• New experimental methods for the rapid prototyping of new products and new manufacturing systems.

Clinton, William J., and Albert Gore, Jr. 1993. Technology for America’s Economic Growth: A New Direction to Build Economic Strength. Among the research areas identified in this document as candidates for increased funding for advanced manufacturing research and development are the following:

• New assembly technologies,

• Intelligent control and sensor technologies,

• Enterprise integration technologies, and

• Rapid prototyping.

Computer Systems Policy Project. 1993. Perspectives on the National Information Infrastructure: CSPP’s Vision and Recommendations for Action. Computer Systems Policy Project, Washington, D.C. CSPP is an affiliation of chief executive officers of U.S. computer companies formed to develop and advocate public policy positions on trade and technology issues that affect the computer industry. Its report advocates the development of a national information infrastructure, which would include a manufacturing infrastructure that incorporates computing and communications technologies to support integrated development, engineering, and manufacturing processes.

Council on Competitiveness. 1991. Gaining New Ground: Technology Priorities for America’s Future. Council on Competitiveness, Washington, D.C. This report identifies critical technologies in materials and associated processing technologies, engineering and production technologies, electronic components, information technologies, and powertrain and propulsion technologies. Within the engineering and production technologies category, it lists the following broad areas as critical to U.S. industrial competitiveness:

• Computer-aided engineering,

• Measurement techniques,

• Systems engineering,

• Computer-integrated manufacturing, and

• Robotics and automated equipment.

Cutkosky, Mark R., et al. 1993. “PACT: An Experiment in Integrating Concurrent Engineering Systems,” Computer, January, pp. 28–37. This paper discusses the initial experiments in distributed simulation and incremental redesign conducted at the Palo Alto Collaborative Testbed (PACT). The experiments represent a step toward the use of agents communicating on a knowledge level to compose large, complex systems out of existing software modules.

Dertouzos, Michael L., Richard K.Lester, and Robert M.Solow. 1989. Made in America: Regaining the Productive Edge. The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. This text offers several strategies for the federal government to improve U.S. manufacturing, including the following (at pp. 153–155):

• Continue investing in basic research activities in science and engineering, including social science;

• Extend research and development support to include a greater emphasis on downstream phases of product and process engineering and on clearing obstacles to innovation;

• Encourage the establishment of a national information infrastructure; and

• Strive for greater efficiency in military research and development and military procurement.

Federal Coordinating Council for Science, Engineering, and Technology. 1993. FCCSET Initiatives in the FY 1994 Budget. Office of Science and Technology Policy, Washington, D.C. This report, which serves as a supplement to the President’s Fiscal Year 1994 Budget, describes the Advanced Manufacturing Technology Initiative as well as five other technology initiatives.

Friedman, Avner, James Glimm, and John Lavery. 1992. The Mathematical and Computational Sciences in Emerging Manufacturing Technologies and Management Practices. Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Philadelphia. This book advocates three-way research efforts by government, academia, and industry on topics including:

• Intelligent manufacturing (specifically, machine vision, motion and robotics, and efficient design and process representation);

• Solid modeling;

• Rapid prototyping;

• Molecular manufacturing;

• Biomanufacturing; and

• Environmentally benign manufacturing.

Kaplan, Gadi (issue editor). 1993. “Manufacturing à la Carte: Agile Assembly Lines, Faster Development Cycles,” IEEE Spectrum, September, pp. 24–85. This special issue on manufacturing describes current trends in advanced manufacturing through case studies and feature articles on flexibility, quality, efficiency, the environment, the economy, government and industry support, education, and the future.

Manufacturing Studies Board, National Research Council. 1991. Improving Engineering Design: Designing for Competitive Advantage. National Academy Press, Washington, D.C. This report recommends the following research for improving engineering design practice:

• “Research is needed to define the various types of prototypes and their purposes, and practical, low-cost, and rapid methods must be developed to meet the needs of each type. For example, for processes such as injection molding, disposable dies may be feasible. Means of reducing the need for physical prototyping can be explored. The goal is to develop methods and tools that enable firms to construct physical prototypes, when necessary, both quickly and inexpensively.” (p. 59)

• “Designing for manufacturing at the conceptual stages and designing for other objectives…at almost any other stage are not supported by any well-developed techniques…. Studies are needed that seek to relate the crucial features of a

product’s early description to its ultimate life-cycle quality and cost in terms of each of the many design objectives.” (p. 60)

• “The object of design processes is to synthesize…separate ideas and information into a unified whole.” (p. 56) The design information and ideas include data about a product’s function, shape, size, materials, and manufacture. Research is needed on synthesis models and methods at the configuration and conceptual levels. Research is also needed on innovation, evaluation, and decision making as these processes apply to design process models and methods (pp. 56–57).

• “Research is needed in tolerance analysis, tolerance representations, tolerance-cost relationships, tolerance-performance relationships, and tolerance standards and measurement methods.” (p. 57)

• Research is needed “(1) to develop new methods of analysis, simulation, and computational prototyping [i.e., the ability to experiment with the behavior of parts or products using their computer representations] that serve early stages of design and the new concurrent design practices, and (2) to make both existing and new tools readily useful to all designers.” (p. 58)

• Design practices will not only improve but also become more efficient if a design knowledge base can be created that is highly accessible to all engineering designers (p. 55).

Manufacturing Studies Board, National Research Council. 1988. A Research Agenda for CIM: Information Technology. National Academy Press, Washington, D.C. This report presents the following research recommendations for the information technology aspects of computer-integrated manufacturing (CIM).

• Recommends research on a number of specific resource management modeling methods, e.g., modeling methods based on knowledge-based systems, object-oriented systems, and Petri nets; methods that are sufficiently fast and efficient that resource problems are tractable while plants are being designed and built, as well as being operated; methods for correcting models, based on comparisons of predicted and measured performance; and many more (pp. 11–13).

• Recommends research on product and process design, including “data structures for describing products in terms of conceptual design, functional features, dimensions and tolerances, manufacturable features; methods that allow such structures to be interfaced with other CIM components, such as knowledge-based systems;…[and] methods for coupling design with process operation, so that process control programs can be derived from designs and vice versa.” (p. 18)

• Recommends research on process planning methods and techniques, including “techniques that, in addition to generating tool and operation sequences, also generate lower-level procedures for setting up tools, controlling them, and advising operators.” (p. 17)

• Recommends research on “methods for representing decision objects, e.g., states, actions, utilities, prior and posterior probabilities, samples, costs, and decisions; methods for mapping these objects to manufacturing objects; development of relevant heuristics and algorithms; [and] exploratory assessment of the merit of these techniques in specific domains.” (p. 20)

• Recommends research on methods and technologies for process operation analysis, optimization, control, and quality assurance (pp. 13–15), and at page 17 recommends research on “methods for coupling process planning with resource allocation and process operation so that these activities can be accomplished concurrently.”

• Recommends research on product and process design (pp. 17–19), including, at page 18, “advances in computational geometry, especially those that ensure the precision of geometric models and operations.”

National Association of Manufacturers. 1992. Crafting a Common Manufacturing R&D Agenda. Washington, D.C., July 14. This report was generated from a workshop to comment on the Federal Coordinating Council on Science, Engineering and Technology (FCCSET) Advanced Manufacturing Technology Initiative. Recommended research topics include:

• Artificial intelligence and expert systems for better intelligent equipment;

• Standards for data communication and mechanical, electrical, and software compatibility, to support better information linkages among cells;

• Common data dictionaries for better intra-cell communication;

• Open cell architecture for rapid reconfiguration;

• In-process, real-time adaptive control for low variability and high quality;

• Replacement materials, chemicals, and processes for making manufacturing more environmentally friendly and energy efficient;

• Standards-based applications protocol data exchange for increasing data exchange capability among engineering, design, simulation, and processing; and

• Communications technology for a national, publicly accessible, interactive, broadband communications network.

National Critical Technologies Panel. 1991. Report of the National Critical Technologies Panel. National Critical Technologies Panel, Arlington, Virginia. This report describes 22 technologies identified as critical to national economic prosperity and to national security by a panel appointed by the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive Office of the President. The advanced manufacturing technologies include

• Flexible computer-integrated manufacturing,

• Intelligent processing equipment, and

• Systems management technologies.

National Research Council. 1991. A Shared Vision of Manufacturing Research: 1990 Japan U.S. Manufacturing Research Exchange. National Academy Press, Washington, D.C. This joint report of the Japanese and U.S. teams participating in the 1990 Japan-U.S. Manufacturing Research Exchange identifies several broad research needs:

• A framework for computational systems,

• Modeling and simulation of process and product, and

• Intelligent manufacturing control.

National Science Foundation. No date. Various unpublished materials: “The NSF Manufacturing Initiative,” “Integrated Tools for Manufacturing Design,” and “Advanced Manufacturing Technology Taxonomy.” National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C.

Pan, Jeff Y-C, and Jay M.Tenenbaum. 1991. “An Intelligent Agent Framework for Enterprise Integration,” IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man and Cybernetics: Special Issue on Distributed Artificial Intelligence, September. This article describes a framework for integrating people and computer systems in large, geographically dispersed manufacturing enterprises. The framework includes numerous computer-based intelligent agents, each of which supports a discrete task.

Prinz, Frederick. 1992. “Incremental Material Deposition: A New Manufacturing Paradigm,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Prinz recommended research in the following areas to support solid free-form fabrication:

• Developing computer-aided decision support design tools,

• Improving precision in shape deposition technologies,

• Expanding the range of materials that can be deposited,

• Expanding the range of material density achievable through shape deposition technologies, and

• Developing thermal spray deposition technologies.

Riesenfeld, Richard F. 1992. “Integrated and Distributed Manufacturing,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Riesenfeld recommended computer science research in the following areas to advance rapid prototyping and distributed manufacturing:

• Feature-based approaches to design and manufacture, and, in particular, development of a high-level, broadly applicable model that supports design, manufacture, and all associated processes for objects with both traditional and sculpted boundaries;

• Paradigms for three-dimensional interactive specification of complex shapes for manufacturing;

• Encapsulation of manufacturing “design rules,” i.e., restrictions based on manufacturability, to constrain designers;

• Generic approaches for specifying mechanical parts;

• Sets of standard processes, fixtures, tools, stock, and so on that define standard manufacturing environments;

• Efficient, effective approaches for specifying fixturing;

• More powerful tools and more powerful methods for developing such tools;

• Integration of design environments and manufacturing environments so that design and manufacture can be accomplished concurrently and so that a designer can accomplish all of his or her tasks within the framework of a complete, coherent, and convenient system. Such a system would support tolerancing, inspection of parts, assembly simulation, and animation;

• Robust, geometric arithmetic algorithms for computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing; and

• Systems that are more supportive of nonideal manufacturing phenomena, such as parts that became distorted during manufacturing; tools that deflect, wear, or vibrate; and situations involving thin walls.

Siewiorek, Daniel P. 1992. “Rapid Prototyping: The Design Process, Tools, and Fabrication,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6 . Siewiorek posed the following research questions that must be resolved before concurrent design and rapid prototyping become integrated into industrial practice:

• How can existing computer-aided design (CAD) tools be integrated into a seamless environment?

• How can the effort to integrate tools be reduced?

• How can the complexity of existing CAD tools be hidden from the user?

• How can changes be propagated from one discipline and/or portion of a design to another?

• What representation should be used to support design across several diverse disciplines?

• How can design information be abstracted for control of manufacturing processes?

• How can manufacturing processes be modeled so that their constraints will be reflected in the design process?

• How can complementary manufacturing processes be selected from a range of such processes to implement a design?

• How can factors downstream in a product’s life cycle (e.g., installation, repair, and disposal) be integrated into the design process?

• How can design and manufacturing information be reused in future products?

• How can the compatibility of new incremental information with all the previously acquired information be ensured?

• How can information be validated? Errors in information are often due to unforeseen compilations of information from various sources or to the use of information in new combinations.

• How can the design and manufacturing process be debugged?

• To what extent should a design be adapted to the manufacturing process, and to what extent should the manufacturing process be adapted to the design?

Steinberg, Louis, 1992. “The Manufacturing Process as a Design Artifact: An Artificial Intelligence Approach,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Steinberg recommended research in the following areas to support intelligent tools for designing manufacturing processes and schedules:

• Guiding the manufacturing process design when there are multiple, conflicting constraints and goals;

• Determining an appropriate division of labor between the human designer and the design tool; and

• Coordinating multiple people and computers working on large manufacturing process design problems.

Tenenbaum, Jay M., and Richard Dove. 1992. “Agile Software for Intelligent Manufacturing,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. The speakers described a number of research areas that would enhance the agility of manufacturing enterprises:

• Virtual factories, i.e., the use of computer simulation to eliminate the time and cost of physically prototyping both products and processes;

• Autonomous agent architecture, i.e., an enterprise architecture in which every person, system, and piece of equipment is represented by an agent;

• Intelligent agents, i.e., autonomous agents that are programmed (by end users) to watch over some element of production, responding to events with actions such as shutting down a machine, starting up a program, or sending a message to another agent;

• Agent-based software interoperation, i.e., software as a service available as needed over a network, rather than purchased as a system; and

• EINet, i.e., a national information infrastructure supporting manufacturing, design, engineering, and analysis.

U.S. Department of Defense, Director of Defense Research and Engineering. 1992. DoD Key Technologies Plan. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. This publication discusses design automation as one of 11 key technology areas of the Defense Department’s science and technology program. Design automation subareas are design and synthesis analysis, product and process definition, and information flow and integration. The specific goals of the design and automation area are

• Unambiguous, easily transportable product descriptions,

• Functional and feature-based design,

• High-fidelity product visualization, and

• Product performance—supportability interaction, (p. 10–2)

Voelcker, Herb. 1992. “New Directions in Solid Modeling?” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Voelcker identified research needs for new or improved capabilities in solid modeling systems for manufacturing and assembly:

• Better sweeping and offsetting techniques;

• Increased ability to handle complex assemblies (e.g., those with more than 10,000 rimitives);

• Easier ways to maintain consistency between multiple representations;

• Increased sensitivity to numerical effects;

• Higher-level human-user interfaces; and

• Better support for molding, casting, deformation, assembly, and other manufacturing applications.

Whitney, Daniel E., and Steven D.Eppinger. 1992. “Modeling and Managing Complex Design Processes,” presentated at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. The speakers identified the following research issues:

• How to represent complex processes (of over 100 steps) so that

  1. people can see what is going on;

  2. some analysis techniques can be applied; and

  3. managers can easily determine which decisions are crucial, which cause delays if they are changed, and which cause problems if they are delayed.

• How to identify the variables in a problem that are most tightly linked to each other and can thus be set fairly freely without upsetting the others.

• How to identify the main subproblems and the decision variables associated with them. These subproblems are not confined to conventional components; some pseudo components exist that should be worked on as units. The pseudo components are hard to identify and may shift identity as parameter values change.

• How to model design processes that are described well by sets of equations and constraints and, by contrast, how to model processes that are described by strings of tasks and decisions. Examples of the latter processes include allocating space and selecting materials.

Will, Peter, 1992. “Intelligent Manufacturing Study,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Will posed the following research question regarding emerging concurrent methodologies:

• What opportunities does the inherent information richness of emerging concurrent methodologies present for improving manufacturing design, fabrication, support, and maintenance?

Wright, Paul K. 1992. “Expert Systems to Support Mechanical Manufacturing,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Wright described “Machinist,” an expert system he is developing that automatically makes process plans for fabricating metal parts on a computerized numerical control (CNC) machine tool. Research in the following areas would benefit the Machinist system.

• New software that reinterprets an IGES or PDES file and creates a feature-based model of the part,

• Information on tolerance specifications, and

• Further protocol analyses.

Wright, Paul K. 1992. “Open-Architecture Manufacturing,” presentation at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Wright recommended research in the following areas to move from the current computer-interfaced manufacturing production systems, in which the various subcomponents are interfaced and share data, to true computer-integrated manufacturing systems, in which the various subcomponents are open and share knowledge:

• New algorithms that use touch-trigger probes to dramatically simplify two-dimensional and three-dimensional fixturing;

• Acoustic emission sensors to monitor and improve tool performance and surface finish;

• Metallurgical model-based control techniques for optimizing speed and feeds;

• Techniques for modeling unavoidable burr formations and computer-vision-guided burr-removal tools; and

• Multimedia user interfaces for user control, apprentice training, and teaching.

Wysk, Richard. 1992. “Integration Requirements for Intelligent Manufacturing,” presented at Information Technology and Manufacturing: A Workshop, National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C., May 5–6. Wysk recommended research to develop a detailed architecture for computer-integrated manufacturing (CIM) hardware and software products. The detailed architecture would enable product vendors to determine what functionality and interfaces their products should include to enable effective integration with other products.