An architecture for metamorphic control of holonic manufacturing systems

Conventional centralised scan-based control systems are not suited to the e volutionary nature of holonic manufacturing systems, i.e. the form and subs tance of holonic systems undergo constant transformation (metamorphosis) th roughout their lifetime. As a result, real-time control of such holonic sys tems requires a radically different approach from that of traditional unit level regulatory control systems necessitating a new system-level distribut ed control approach. Control systems based on this approach can termed as m etamorphic control systems. The engineering of such software-centric metamorphic control systems for dy namically reconfigurable distributed multisensor-based holonic systems is a ddressed in this paper. An integrated and uniform. event-driven control arc hitecture is specified for various functional levels of the metamorphic con trol system. This architecture utilises the emerging International Electrot echnical Commission function block standard (IEC 61499) for industrial proc ess measurement and control systems to specify the requisite behaviour of d istributed control software components (agents). (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.