Design for the Unexpected: From Holonic Manufacturing Systems towards a Humane Mechatronics Society

Design for the Unexpected: From Holonic Manufacturing Systems Towards a Humane Mechatronics Society presents new, even revolutionary, ideas to managing production and production systems which may fundamentally shift the paradigm of manufacturing systems design. It provides guidelines for the design of complex systems that can deal with unexpected disturbances and presents a decentralized control methodology that goes far beyond the traditional hierarchical control approach that currently prevails.

The benefits are illustrated by a variety of examples and case studies from different fields, with the book's  well-established authors presenting Holonic Manufacturing Systems (HMS) as the framework for the ‘factory-of-the-future’, and suggesting that the application of biologically inspired control paradigms can control complex manufacturing systems, and that there are far wider applications for these systems than pure manufacturing. In addition, the book explores how this multi-agent control framework can be extended to other fields such as traffic, transport, services, and health care.

Provides a practical control system architecture that can be applied to a wide variety of systems in manufacturing, transportation, logistics, and roboticsContains a wide range of case studies from different engineering disciplinesProvides a decentralized control methodology that goes beyond the traditional hierarchical control approach that currently prevailsA must-read resource for researchers and professionals alike

Introduction
Chapter 1: Setting the stage
Chapter 2: On the design of complex systems
Cahpter 3: Design for the Unexpected
Chapter 4: The Laws of the Artficial
Chapter 5: Holonic Manufacturing Systems (HMS)
Chapter 6: The ARTI Reference Architecture. PROSA revisited
Chapter 7: Case studies and research projects
Chapter 8: Work by others
Chapter 9: Concluding remarks