Artificial Intelligence Applications in Manufacturing

Book excerpt: The past decade has seen considerable advances in CAE tools that employ leading-edge artificial intelligence techniques and that can be used with CAD/CAM tools to reduce design costs. In three parts, this book covers current Al applications that can prove beneficial in the design and planning stages of manufacturing, that can assist in solving scheduling and control problems, and that can be used in manufacturing integration.A. F. Famili is Research Scientist at the Knowledge Systems Laboratory of the National Research Council of Canada. Steven H. Kim is Visiting Fellow at the Design Research Institute, Cornell University. Dana S. Nau an Associate Professor in the Computer Science Department at the University of Maryland.Contents: Application of Machine Learning to Industrial Planning and Decision Making. Incorporating Special Purpose Resource Design in Planning to Make More Efficient Plans. Geometric Reasoning Using a Feature Algebra. Backward Assembly Planning Symmetry Groups in Solid Model-Based Assembly Planning. An Expert System Approach for Economic Evaluation of Machining Operation Planning. Interactive Problem Solving for Production Planning. An Abstraction-Based Search and Learning Approach for Effective Scheduling. ADDYMS: Architecture for Distributed Dynamic Manufacturing Scheduling. An Architecture for Real Time Distributed Scheduling. Teamwork Among Intelligent Agents: Framework and Case Study in Robotic Service. Exploiting Local Flexibility During Execution of Precomputed Schedules. Symbolic Representation and Planning for Robot Control Systems in Manufacturing. An Architecture for Integrating Enterprise Automation. An Intelligent Agent Framework for Enterprise Integration. Integrated Software System for Intelligent Manufacturing. Enterprise Management Network Architecture: A Tool for Manufacturing Enterprise Integration. Design and Manufacturing: Integration through Quality.