Hierarchical production control for a flow shop with dynamic setup changes and random machine breakdowns

In this paper, we study a manufacturing system consisting of two machines separated by two intermediate buffers, and capable of producing two different products. Each product requires a constant processing time on each of the machines. Each machine requires a constant non-negligible setup change time from one product to the other. The demand rate for each product is considered to be piecewise constant. Each machine undergoes failure and repair. The time-to-failure and time-to-repair are exponentially distributed random variables. The setup change and processing operations are resumable. We model our system as a continuous time, continuous flow process. An optimal control problem is formulated for the system to minimize the total expected discounted cost over an infinite horizon. To determine the optimal control policy structure, a discrete version of the problem is solved numerically using a dynamic programming formulation with a piecewise linear penalty function. A real-time control algorithm is then developed with the objective of maintaining low work-in-process inventory and keeping the production close to the demand. The algorithm uses a hierarchical control structure to generate the loading times for each product on each machine in real time and to respond to random disruptions in the system. The system is simulated using this algorithm to study its performance. The performance of the algorithm is also compared to alternative policies.     

国外混合微电子技术的新进展

混合微电子技术，推动了整个电子工业的发展。从市场和技术两个方面评述这种发展态势，重点介绍先进混合集成技术。     

How to Control Robots Interacting with Dynamic Environment

The goal of this paper is to shed light on the control problem of constrained robot motion from the aspect of the dynamical nature of the environment with which the robot is in contact. Therefore, the criticism of traditional hybrid control which allows position/force feedback loops to split into independent control with respect to position and force, is not the main point we want to make. Reference to the papers written by the founders of hybrid control and their numerous followers served only to better understand the reason and motivation for suggesting a different approach to control of robots interacting with environment.The paper has a predominantly review character, based on recently published work. It also contains some new, unpublished results in the framework of the unified approach to the position/force control of robots, proposed by the present author and his co-workers. By pointing to the possibility of introducing an environment dynamics in the contact tasks of the machining type, the author emphasizes that the proposed dynamically interactive control can be applied to a completely different class of tasks, in which a contact is made between the system (constructions or structure) and very specific kinds of dynamic environments.     

柔性制造系统生产中的零件分批算法

根据ＦＭＳ资源、加工任务、零件工艺提出了零件分批算法，该算法在零件交货期的束下，以机床负荷平衡为目标，搜索零件集合，找出最合适的零件组合形成零件加工批。此算法为简化ＦＭＳ的动态调度和提高系统生产率创造了条件。仿真结果表明分批算法是行之有效的。     

On the curing of a vinylester-urethane hybrid resin

Curing kinetics of a vinylester-urethane hybrid (VEUH) resin consisting of vinylester resin (VE) diluted in styrene and novolac type polyisocyanate (NPI) have been studied by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). As VEUH is crosslinked via free radical polymerisation between the vinyl functions of styrene and VE, and polyaddition reaction between the secondary -OH groups of VE and -NCO of NPI, it was necessary to study these reactions separately. This was achieved by studying the curing with and without incorporating the NPI. The curing reaction was monitored by measuring the heat of reaction under isothermal and dynamic temperature conditions. Models describing the curing were developed, which are in good agreement with the experiments. A comparison between the curing of the VEUH and the VE resin without NPI leads to the conclusion that the curing of the VEUH as accessed by DSC is dominated by the radical polymerisation of styrene with VE although the two reactions are not time separated.     

计及PMU的混合非线性状态估计新方法

提出一种将同步相量测量单元（PMU）的直接电压相量量测变换为间接支路电流量测，并与监控与数据采集（SCADA）量测量一起进行混合迭代的非线性状态估计方法。对构造等效电流修正量而带来的间接量测误差进行了详细和定量的分析，并对该混合估计算法的精度进行了定性分析和定量计算。理论分析和算例表明，该方法可以获得较高的估计精度，在收敛次数和滤波效果上也有所改进。     

Multi-plant production scheduling in SMEs

Traditionally, companies used to view themselves as separate entities and did not devote efforts to collaborate with other echelons of the extended enterprise. This even happened at multi-site companies owning different plants that belonged to the same supply chain. However, manufacturing facilities of the same supply chain should intensively share information and coordinate planning and scheduling tasks in order to get a globally optimized solution. This paper discusses some specific characteristics of the planning and scheduling problem in the extended enterprise including an analysis of a case study, and reviews the available state-of-the-art research studies in this field. Most studies suggest that integrated approaches can have a significant impact on the system performance, in terms of lower production costs, and less inventory levels. The paper provides some conclusions and suggestions of future works.     

A multi-objective programming model for scheduling emergency medicine residents

Scheduling emergency medicine residents (EMRs) is a complex task, which considers a large number of rules (often conflicting) related to various aspects such as limits on the number of consecutive work hours, number of day and night shifts that should be worked by each resident, resident staffing requirements according to seniority levels for the day and night shifts, restrictions on the number of consecutive day and night shifts assigned, vacation periods, weekend off requests, and fair distribution of responsibilities among the residents. Emergency rooms (ERs) are stressful workplaces, and in addition shift work is well-known to be more demanding than regular daytime work. For this reason, preparing schedules that suit the working rules for EMRs is especially important for reducing the negative impact on shift workers physiologically, psychologically, and socially. In this paper, we present a goal programming (GP) model that accommodates both hard and soft constraints for a monthly planning horizon. The hard constraints should be adhered to strictly, whereas the soft constraints can be violated when necessary. The relative importance values of the soft constraints have been computed by the analytical hierarchy process (AHP), which are used as coefficients of the deviations from the soft constraints in the objective function. The model has been tested in the ER of a major local university hospital. The main conclusions of the study are that problems of realistic size can be solved quickly and the generated schedules have very high qualities compared to the manually prepared schedules, which require a lot of effort and time from the chief resident who is responsible for this duty.     

The Effect of Polymer Optoelectronic Properties on the Performance of Multilayer Hybrid Polymer/TiO2 Solar Cells

We report a study of the effects of polymer optoelectronic properties on the performance of photovoltaic devices consisting of nanocrystalline TiO₂ and a conjugated polymer. Three different poly(2‐methoxy‐5‐(2′‐ethylhexoxy)‐1,4‐phenylenevinylene) (MEH‐PPV)‐based polymers and a fluorene–bithiophene copolymer are compared. We use photoluminescence quenching, time‐of‐flight mobility measurements, and optical spectroscopy to characterize the exciton‐transport, charge‐transport, and light‐harvesting properties, respectively, of the polymers, and correlate these material properties with photovoltaic‐device performance. We find that photocurrent is primarily limited by the photogeneration rate and by the quality of the interfaces, rather than by hole transport in the polymer. We have also studied the photovoltaic performance of these TiO₂/polymer devices as a function of the fabrication route and device design. Including a dip‐coating step before spin‐coating the polymer leads to excellent polymer penetration into highly structured TiO₂ networks, as was confirmed through transient optical measurements of the photoinduced charge‐transfer yield and recombination kinetics. Device performance is further improved for all material combinations studied, by introducing a layer of poly(ethylene dioxythiophene) (PEDOT) doped with poly(styrene sulfonic acid) (PSS) under the top contact. Optimized devices incorporating the additional dip‐coated and PEDOT:PSS layers produced a short‐circuit current density of about 1 mA cm^–2, a fill factor of 0.50, and an open‐circuit voltage of 0.86 V under simulated AM 1.5 illumination (100 mW cm^–2, 1 sun). The corresponding power conversion efficiency under 1 sun was ≥ 0.4 %.